Quest for Erebor
by DwarvenWarrior
Summary: Ristaë is Dwalins daughter and has been friends with Fili and Kili for decades. But during this quest, will the feelings of friendship be pushed further? Please read and review! T just to be safe! Eventual Kili/OC
1. Chapter 1

**CHey this is my new story! By the way, if you haven't seen the Desolation of SMAUG trailer yet, I highly recommend that you do!**

**Disclaimer, I own NOTHING apart from OC's!**

**CHAPTER**

Brrrrrrringggg! Brrrrrrrrrrringggg! I felt the door bell vibrate under my fingertips. I glanced over at my father and he smirked at me, knowing that I felt apprehensive for this journey. The door swung open on the second ring and was answered by a small man, a hobbit to be precise.

"Dwalin, at your service," bowed my father.

"And Ristaë, at your service," said I, also bowing.

"Bilbo Baggins," he then hastily tied his dressing gown up, "at yours."

"Which way laddie? Is it down here?" demanded Dwalin, stepping into the hobbit hole utterly uninvited.

Bilbo looked stunned, "which way is what?"

"Supper," replied Dwalin, looking at Bilbo as if he was a total idiot.

"I'm sorry, do we know each other?" he asked me.

"Nope!" I said brightly, "but we do now!"

Bilbo huffed in annoyance and hurried off to get food from the pantry for us so that he didn't appear as rude. Within minutes me and my father had a plateful each of delicious food and were eagerly tucking in when the door bell rang again. We paused in our very undignified way of shovelling our food into our mouths and smiled. We thought we knew who it was because we had seen his silhouette in the distance with his trademark beard easily seen. Sure enough, Balin came through the door, head butted his brother and hugged me.

By now me and Dwalin had finished our food and were ready to rummage around in the pantry for more. After rummaging around for a while we found something very odd.

"What's this?" I asked holding up a chunk of mouldering stuff.

Balin sniffed it, "I think it's meant to be cheese."

"But it's riddled with mould!" I said amazed.

"Oh well," said Balin and tossed it on the floor where it landed with a splat.

Then the doorbell rang again and I looked up.

"Fili," said one.

"And Kili," said the other.

"At your service," they said to together and bowed low in perfect sync.

I grinned and had to bite my lip to keep myself from squealing at the sight of my best friends from childhood! I slammed down the loaf of bread I was holding in my hand squashing it profoundly out of shape.

"Fili! Kili!" I squealed and raced towards them and chugged them both tightly. "I've missed you," I mumbled in their shoulders.

"Ristaë? Is it really you?" Kili stared at me in disbelief, "is it really you?"

Fili reacted quicker than his brother and swiftly hugged me back. "Ristaë, its great to see you again! We haven't seen you for years!"

"Nor I you," I answered.

Now in case you're wondering, I grew up with Fili and Kili because my father is close friends with their Uncle and Mother. We had bonded instantly and had stayed firm friends throughout childhood. We hadn't seen each other since I left for an apprentice with a human swords master, 10 years ago.

"You look different..." frowned Kili.

I laughed, "of course I do! We last saw each other 10 years ago!"

Until this moment, their faces had still been in shadow from the darkness, but as they stepped into the hobbit hole at last I noticed something. They look different as well, in a good way of course. My eyes widened. No longer were they the disheveled fairly unnoticeable dwarfs that I had known. For a start they were all neat and Fili had numerous braids and a moustache whist Kili still only had stubble and no braids at all. All of these differences made them well, _hot. _Especially-

"Shut up," I told myself very firmly, "don't do this." I refused to crush on the brothers. Their friendship was too important to be risked Abu a stupid crush.

I blinked, smiled and led them through to the dinning room where they promptly began shifting the table into the hallway tot make from for the rest of the gathering. I leant against the wall and smiled, it was great to see the brothers again but there was one thing that had been nagging me in the corner of my mind. Thorin, Thorin, Thorin. It went. Thorin Oakenshield. The last time I had seen him we had had an argument about how he ruled the exiled dwarves if Erebor. It was very possible that he would boot me off the quest to reclaim Erebor with great gusto. Though if he did, my father would leave with me and Thorin would loose one of his best fighters. Somehow, I didn't think he would risk that.

The doorbell rang AGAIN and a rather indignant Bilbo hurried off the open it wishing and hoping it wouldn't be more dwarves! When he opened the door 8 dwarves tumbled in and fell in a big heap just inside the door. Unfortunately, the fattest one, Bombur, fell on top! They obviously all groaned and moaned and wriggled about on the floor trying to dislodge him without much success. In fact, they failed miserably until Gandalf, who was standing behind them reached in and yanked him off the pile with a large degree of difficulty.

I giggled, This'd this always happen?" I asked Bofur, "this happened at the last party I went to with it you lot as well!"

"Humph," grumbled Bofur, "it's happened to you to!"

I sighed, "so it has, but only once!"

Bofur grinned, bowed and walked off to the others to grab some long awaited food.

**Sooooo what do you think? I hope you like it! Please please please! Review! Please! Thanks for reading and I hope an update will be up soon:)**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hi here is the next chapter! Wow, I didn't expect such a reaction to the first chapter! Thank you so much!**

**Disclaimer: I own NOTHING! Never have, never will!**

**on we go with the chapter!**

_"Blunt the knives, bend the forks!" _sang Kili.

_"Smash the bottles and burn the corks!" _followed Fili.

_"Chip the glasses and crack the plates!" _the rest of us joined in heartily, _"that's what Bilbo Baggins hates! _

_Cut the cloth, trail the fat,_

_leave the bones on the bedroom mat,_

_pour the milk on the pantry floor,_

_smash the wine in every door!"_

While singing this merry little tune, all of the plates were gradually getting cleaned, dried and stacked up.

_"THAT'S WHAT BILBO BAGGINS HATES!" _we finished with whoops and foot stomping!

We were all crowded around one end of the table when a rather furious Bilbo rounded the corner, it seemed him complaints had gone unheard whilst we had sang. No wonder he looked annoyed! When he saw all of his crockery stacked up in a large, if not wobbly pile, the look on his face was priceless and we were all in hysterics again!

Thump. Thump. Thump. Everyone fell silent, hardly daring to breath.

"He is here," murmured Gandalf.

Bilbo walked hesitantly to the door, not quite sure if what to expect. Kili saw me biting my lip.

"Go to the back Ristaë, and stay with me and Fili," he muttered to me.

And to reassure me further still, he grasped my hand which I took gladly as i tingle ran up my spine. Fili joined us and took my other hand. I sighed in relief, I was with my two best friends, what more could I wish for?

The door creaked open and revealed the dark shadow of a dwarf who held himself with a regal bearing. Long hair, fur shoulders, midnight blue fur trimmed cloak. It was Thorin. Thorin surveyed the gathering with his piercing icy blue eyes that looked the same that they had 10 years ago, and removed and hung up his cloak. He looked at Bilbo and his shoulders sagged slightly, so slightly that I think only I perceived the small movement. Kili and Fili felt me tense slightly and they squeezed my hands.

"So, this is our burglar..." frowne Thorin, "tell me Mister Baggins have you done much fighting?"

"I-I have some skill in conkers if you must know," said poor Bilbo, getting completely the wrong end of the stick.

Everyone sniggered and even Gandalf had to suppress a chuckle. Thorin rolled his eyes,

"I thought as much, he looks more like a grocer than a burgurlar."

That comment brought on another round of snorts and chuckles.

"Supper, where is it?" demanded Thorin rather rudely.

"This way," mumbled Bilbo and we all parted to make a passage for Thorin to go down through sturdy dwarven bodies.

I wasn't quite fast enough and Thorin glimpsed my face as he strode past me. But that was all it took.

"You..." he growled.

"Yeah it's me," I replied as cheerily as I could when my heart was racing as fast as a gale force wind.

"What are you doing here?" glared Thorin.

"I've already signed the contract," I pointed out, "so you can't boot me off this quest!"

"Who brought you here?" he grumbled.

"Dwalin, my father obviously," I said smugly.

"If she goes, I go," said Dwalin.

Thorin wasn't prepared to loose one of his best fighters and best friend.

"Fine! But if she causes trouble or distractions then she goes WITHOUT you Dwalin!" he said reluctantly.

I sighed in relief, at least I would be able to stay on the quest for a while yet. As soon as Thorin walked away to his dinner, Kili and Fili both inexplicably hugged me I hugged them back and then detached myself from them and we walked into the next room to listen to Thorin.

Once we were all settled, my father spoke,

"What of the Ironhills? Is Dain with us?"

Thorin sighed, "no, they say that the quest is ours and ours alone," Thorin sighed regretfully.

At this the atmosphere in the crowded room took a turn for the worst. Everyone apart from Gandalf and Bilbo muttered morose curses under their breath.

"Despite this drawback, we must do this, the dragon Smaug hasn't been seen for 60 years, the vast wealth of our people may now lie unprotected. Do we sit back while others claim what is rightfully ours? Or do we seize this chance, to take back Erebor?!" rallied Thorin enthusiastically.

With that we broke out into cheers and whoops, our morales restored. Balin silenced them with a few short words.

"But your forgetting, the front hate is sealed, there's no way into the mountain."

Everyone promptly quietened down.

"That my dear Balin is not entirely true..." cliffhangered Gandalf.

He produced a wrought iron key from the air in the blink of an eye and we all stared at it. Thorin, Balin and Dwalin in disbelief.

"If there's a key, then there must be a door," mused Fili excitedly.

Everyone held their breath.

"Exactly!" beamed Gandalf and everyone breathed again.

"There's another way in!" breathed Kili.

Gandalf nodded, "the task I have in mind will need courage, strength and no small amount of stealth. But I believe it can be done."

"That's why we need a burglar," figured out Ori.

"And a good one to probably," added Bilbo.

"And are you?" enquired Gloin.

"No way! I've never stolen a thing in my life!" exclaimed Bilbo.

Me, Fili and Kili exchanged a look. Bilbo Baggins, a burglar? Err, no! Not likely!

"Yeah, well, no offence Mr Baggins but you don't really look like a burglar to me..." said Dori gently.

Bilbo nodded vigorously, "exactly! I definitely shouldn't come with you then!" Bilbo seemed to wiggle his way out of coming with us. I suppose he was a hobbit and hobbits weren't generally known for their bravery.

"Wait so why would you need a burglar anyway?" asked Bilbo stupidly.

I groaned inwardly and rolled my eyes, out of the corner of eyes I saw Fili and Kili do the same. We really hadn't changed at all over the past 10 years. Then Gandalf proceeded to explain all about the quest and Thorin thrust him a contract which he bizarrely began to read carefully!

"Laceration? Incineration!?" gasped Bilbo in shock.

"Oh aye, it'll melt the flesh off your bones in the blink of an eye!" said Bofur.

Bilbo looked like he was about to faint.

"Air, air, I need some air," he gasped. Bofur got the wrong end of the stick and began to explain more graphically what would happen if Smaug caught you.

"Think flash of light, searing pain, then POUF your nothing more than a pile of ash!" he elaborated.

"Nope!" said Bilbo and fell to the floor in a dead faint.

Gandalf tutted,"oh very helpful Bofur..."

**Soooooooo... Please please please review, follow and favourite! Thank you thank you thank you! I will update ASAP chapter 3 is written and waiting to be typed up!:)**


	3. Chapter 3

**Yay! Chapter 3! Thank you to my followers and reviewers and favouriters!**

**Chapter 3 :)**

Everyone sniggered at the sight of Bilbo flat on the floor and Thorin looked like 'I told you so!' I decided that it would be a bit mean to just leave him there on the floor so when everyone got up, I dragged Fili and Kili over with me to move him out of the way.

"Fili, you go and find a chair that we can put Bilbo in until he comes round, Kili, you help me move him," I said decisively. They grumbled a bit but I gave them my infamous 'Thorin face' and Fili found a chair whilst Kili helped me move Bilbo. Kili took Bilbo's rather smelly feet and I took his shoulders and together we manoeuvred him into the chair that Fili had found. We left him there and passed Gandalf as he went into the room to talk to Bilbo when he woke. There was nowhere to sit so ow gent outside to get some fresh air and clear my mind a bit.

After a few minutes aid being alone and peaceful, I became aware if another presence behind me.

"I know you're there. I can hear you breathing," I said to whoever was behind me.

Whoever was behind me cursed softly under their breath, though not quite loud enough for me not to recognise their voice. Someone stepped forward and I instantly realised who it was when the soft light from the moon and stars illuminated their face. It was Kili, I could tell that easily from the lack of a beard.

"Ristaë I meant to ask you earlier but I never did, did your apprenticeship really last 10 years?" asked Kili.

Poo. How was I supposed to answer this? Maybe I should just tell him the truth.

"Well... Umm... You see I-I was only on the apprenticeship for 5 years, I was travelling for the other 5."

Predictably, Kili's eyes widened,

"so you could have come back 5 years ago? Do you have any idea of what Fili and I went through when you left?"

Well that stumped me. What did he mean?

"Kili," I began, "what do you mean?"

"You were like a sister to us," I could have sworn I saw his eyes glint with unspilt tears, "it was like a part of us went missing when you left," he croaked.

"Oh Kili," I sighed, "I'm back now." And gave him a hug.

He hugged me back and for a split second I thought he was going to kiss me. But he didn't, obviously.

"Come on, we'd better get back inside before Thorin starts yelling," pointed out Kili. I agreed reluctantly and we headed back inside the apple green door.

Once we were inside, we found the Company in a darkened room with a gently blazing fire. Then Thorin began to sing in a deep somewhat soothing voice.

_"Far over the misty mountains cold,  
To dungeons deep, and caverns old,  
We must away,'ere break of day,  
To find our long forgotten gold." _we all began to sing,  
_"The pines were roaring on the height,_  
_The winds were moaning in the night,_  
_The fire was red, it flaming spread,_  
_The trees like torches blazed with light..." _

We finished the final verse and fell silent, as we stood in silence, we could hear the faint echos of the haunting song running through the halls of Bag End.

**This chapter was a filler but the next chapter will be up as fast as I can:)**

**Please follow, favourite and leave** **a review!**


	4. Chapter 4

Sorry** the last chapter was a filler! But here is a full length one!**

**Please review etc**

**Disclaimer: I own NOTHING**

"Ristaë! Ristaë! Wake up!" laughed Kili as he successful woke me up from a deep slumber. "Wake up! Fili has a cup of COLD water that's aimed at your head!"

Now that really got through to my sleepy brain and I jerkily got to my feet to avoid an unpleasant early morning shower from Fili.

"Can we call you 'Taë' again? Only Ristaë's a bit of a mouthful sometimes," asked Fili.

I nodded, "yeah, sure."

Kili grinned, "hurry up or Bombur will have eaten everything!"

"No he won't! I will!" I retorted playfully and raced off to the kitchen to grath something to eat before it all disappeared. Luckily, I got there in time to snaffle a plate of the last of the bacon and the general remains of what was left. I then took my plate and scoffed breakfast at the now-restored-to-its-proper-place table. I glanced up at the clock and frowned, Bilbo was now where to be seen and we would be leaving shortly! Then Gandalf walked past me, ducking his head to avoid hitting it on the low ceiling.

"Gandalf, is Bilbo coming with us?" I asked him curiously.

"I hope so my dear Ristaë, I hope so," he answered. He then inclined his head to me and went to find Thorin to discuss the journey even more.

It seemed that most of the dwarves were eating in the crowded kitchen as only me and Ori were eating calmly at the actual table. After breakfast everyone joined in a huge cleaning session to make Bag End look presentable once again. Once that was done Thorin ordered us to pack up and go out to the ponies.

As I ducked my head under the door stage first thing I saw was the idyllic view that I never saw last night. It was like something out if a story book with the Hobbit Hole dotted about the rolling hills and the Hobbits themselves walking about with their hairy feet.

I easily spotted my pony in the midst of the other ponies as she was the only Appaloosa amongst the wide range of pony colours. I walked over to her and gave her her breakfast in a muzzle bag and slipped it over her nose and ears so she could munch it whilst we plodded along. I mounted and waited for Bombur to clamber onto his poor pony so we could start.

"Hey Nori!" called Bofur, "do you think Mr Baggins will turn up?"

Nori thought for a few moments, "nah, he seems like too much of a coward to me."

"I'll go up against you in that!" I shouted, "1 bag of silver say. Bilbo will turn up!"

Only Thorin didn't join in in the betting so the group was perfectly split into whether or not they thought Bilbo would turn up.

Bilbo lived fairly close to a forest so within minutes we were surrounded by thick undergrowth and towering trees. At first I rode on my own at the back to stay well out if Thorin's way but Fili and Kili quickly made their way to my side and began quizzing me about warfare to check if I knew about it or not. They clearly didn't trust the people I was apprenticed with.

"This is an easy question but-"

"WAIT! WAIT!" yelled a vaguely familiar voice.

The teller then burst through the trees behind us and ran towards Balin without looking like he would slow down. It was Bilbo! He had come after all then! Then that meant I had won the bet along with the Dwarves and Gandalf that had sided with me!

"I signed it!" said Bilbo happily.

Balin examined it and gave Bilbo the all clear, "welcome Master Baggins, to the Company of Thorin Oakenshield."

Everyone except Thorin cheered and whooped. Thorin merely said,

"Give him a pony."

"Oh no. That won't be necessary! I've done plenty of walking holidays, I even got as far as Frogmorten once-" Bilbo was abruptly cut off as Nori and Gloin reached down and basically tossed him onto the spare luggage pony, Myrtle.

We had barely gone 100 yards when Bilbo yelled something.

"Stop! Stop! We've got to turn around!"

"Whatever is the matter Bilbo?" exclaimed Gandalf as all of us looked at him in exasperation.

"I've forgotten my handkerchief!" everyone growled and sighed.

"Here, use this," offered Bofur and ripped off part of the bottom of his tunic and tossed it to Bilbo.

Bilbo caught it and looked at it like it was the most disgusting thing ever. I laughed, what a prissy boy!

"Move on!" bellowed Thorin and we all kicked our ponies forwards once again.

After a few minutes chat resumed again and Bilbo was basically ignored apart from the odd comment that was usually an insult.

"Taë do you remember when we tied Thorin's hair to the bed post when he was sleeping?" grinned Fili.

"Oh yeah! He had a bald patch for weeks!" I laughed at the hilarious memory of Thorin waking up to find his hair tied to a bed post. Of course, he had bolted upright really fast when we had woken him up and he ripped a large portion of hair right out. He then started yelling swear words and curses.

"I think that was when I learnt my first curse," chuckled Kili.

"Do you remember when..." and we went on like this until lunchtime and we stopped for lunch by a small stream to replenish our water skins and eat a meagre lunch. I heard a low growl behind me and I pivoted round on my heel drawing my long double sided sword oat the same time. I expected Orcs or Goblins it was merely Fili and Kili standing with their backs to me and in the middle of a heated whispered argument. I sighed, sheathed my blade and went to break it up. As I drew nearer, the whisperes gradually grew clearer though I still had absolutely no idea what they were on about.

"Let's bet on it!" hissed Fili.

"Fine!" Kili hissed back and they shook hands.

"1bag of gold."

"Fine!"

"What in the name of Mahal are you two talking about?" I asked. They both jumped at the sound of my voice and turned to face me with guilty looks on their faces.

"Oh, umm, hi?" said Kili rather sheepishly.

"So, what were you talking about?" I raised my eyebrows.

"Oh, err nothing in particular! What did you have for lunch?" sidetracked Fili as he tried to change the subject dramatically.

"Same as you obviously," I replied, "what were you betting about?"

"Betting about?" echoed Kili.

"What is there to bet about anyway?" backed up Fili.

"Apparently, there's something worth 1 bag of gold," I probed further.

Kili but his lip, "oh, what else did you hear?" he asked somewhat nervously.

"Only the stuff after 'let's bet on it!'" I replied, they both sighed in relief, "why is there something I should have heard?"

"No, no!" said Fili a little too brightly.

I looked at mistrustfully, I'd weasel the answer out of them eventually, for now, I would just wait for them to let their guard down and ask them at random intervals. I was determined to find out. Thorin then yelled at us to mount up so we mounted our ponies and moved on again with the sun shining high above our heads and the clouds ahead been banished from view.

"Ristaë come I need to talk to you," said Thorin rather sternly.

**Sooooo... Not much to say really... But please review etc and let me know how to improve it and stuff like that! See ya next chapter!**


	5. Chapter 5 part 1

**Disclaimer: As usual I own nothing apart from my OC!**

**Slight gore at the end but nothing major by the way!**

_**previously...**_

_**"Ristaë come here, I need to talk to you," said Thorin rather sternly.**_

"O-k?" I said slowly while the others looked at me nervously. I rode up to Thorin at the front and Spring walked quietly beside Thorin's pony.

Thorin finally spoke, "why did you decide to come?"

"Why did I decide to come," I repeated dryly, "did you ever think that it might be because it was a chance to see old friends? To be part of the reclamation of Erebor?"

"Well not if you put it that way-" Thorin began but I cut him off.

"No, you obviously didn't so don't even pretend to try to think of an excuse to cover it up!"

Thorun tried to say something else but he never got the chance to as I wheeled Spring round on her hind quarters and disrespectfully left him as I cantered back to Fili and Kili muttering obscenities under my breath.

"What did he want?" muttered Fili.

"Oh you know, he wanted to know why I came with you all," I muttered back.

"Yeah, I thought it might be something like that as Thorin hates not knowing things when it concerns people close to him," Fili said back. We continued to ride on in near silence with the occasional attempt to start conversation and failing. Though eventually Bofur succeeded and we walked on chatting and laughing apart from Thorin who stayed in a brooding silence.

"So, I asked Kili under the cover of the others laughter and the safety of being at the back of the company, "what were you and Fili betting about?" I could have sworn I saw him blush slightly but his stubble concealed his cheeks so I wasn't sure.

"What did we bet about?" echoed Kili.

"Yes," I said impatiently.

"Oh, umm... Err... Oh yes, umm, who will go into Erebor first out of us two!"

I raised an eyebrow, "really?"

"Yes really!" insisted Kili.

"Hmm..." I narrowed my eyes but dropped the subject.

The light gradually grew steadily darker until dusk when Thorin finally declared that we would be stopping when we reached the small flat area under the cliff just ahead of us. I smiled in relief, at last we could stop after a gruelling day in the saddle.

"Alright there?" asked Fili.

"Yeah I'm good apart from the fact that my bum is SO sore!"

"Same," grinned Kili, "I know how you feel only too well."

I was just about to say something to that when I noticed that everyone had come to a stop and were tethering their ponies to nearby trees.

"Yes! Finally!" I cheered out and dismounted in a very ungraceful fashion. "Ahhh, that's better," I sighed as I stood upright on my feet for the first time in hours. I then lead Spring, who stepped after me wearily, to a place with plenty of grass to eat and fresh water to drink. Then I carefully took off her tack, I could practically hear her sigh in relief, and made my way to the fire to set up my bedroll in between Fili's and Kili's. As I did so, a thought entered my head. The idea of using my saddle as a kind of pillow. I noticed that Kili and Fili both had new looking blue bedrolls whilst I had my tattered and patched pale green one. Their mother, Dis, had obviously made new ones specially for this journey. I had my mother's old one, she had given it to me the day she had died.

**_Flash back_**

_"Ristaë," rasped my mother, "I'm dying."_

_"No, no! You can't! I whispered desperately._

_"I'm ill and far too weak to survive. It will ha-" she burst into a coughing fit and spewed up phlegm and scarlet blood. "It will happen within the week, look under my bed and pass me my bedroll."_

_I hesitantly got down onto my hands and knees and pulled out my mother's bedroll. I passed it to her with trembling fingers and a grief stricken expression on my face. She then started coughing again, more blood and this time thin hits if internal skin came up as well. My mouth dropped open, horrified. My mother really was dying, this was proof enough._

_"Mum! Please stop! Let me get a healer! You can't die!" I said desperately._

_"There is no cure for my illness, it is rare so little is known about it," said my mother bleakly._

_There was a silence. Neither of us said anything. Not wishing to cause the other further pain._

_"Take my bedroll," my mother finally croaked, "take it and whenever you use it remember me."_

_By this time tears were pouring unchecked down my face like there'd was no tomorrow and my mother was weeping to. This triggered another another coughing fit, this time worse than ever before._

_"Mum! You must stop coughing! Have a drink of water!" I pleaded._

_She sighed heavily, "if I drink, then the fluid will go to my lungs and kill me instantly," she coughed some more while I looked on in despair, unable to do anything to help or heal. "I need to say goodbye to Dwalin, he and you are my only living family left. Please go and get him."_

_Still sobbing uncontrollably, I left the room to the sound of my mother coughing once again and found Dwalin in the kitchen._

_"Mother's dying," I cried, "why her? Why does Aulë want her? Why not another that would not be so sorely missed?"_

_Tears welled up in my father's eyes, "I know, she told me yesterday," he said and hugged me and tried to comfort me to no success._

_"She wants to talk to you, before she-" I started bawling again, unable to stop._

_Dwalin nodded slowly, "I'll go now," he hugged me one last time and left the room to go to my dying mother. I laid my head down on the table and continued to weep in my lament. Clutching my mother's bedroll all the long while._

_After about half an hour or so, my father returned to the kitchen crying silent tears and I knew it had happened. My mother was dead._

_ ** End flashback**_

"Taë? Are you ok?" asked Ori looking at me oddly. Then I realised that I was staring into space with tears rolling down my cheeks.

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine thank Ori," I said wiping away the tears.

Ori nodded, "ok," he looked into my eyes once more and walked off to help Bombur with dinner.

I stared into the fire and watched the flickering orange flames licking and devouring the wood. My eyes followed a spark as it danced and twirled in the dark sky. As I watched it go out, I noticed a pair of brown eyes subtly trained on me, watching me carefully. It was Kili I realised in shock, why would he stare at me so? I raised an eyebrow at him and he finally figured out I was looking at him and he turned his head away and reddened slightly u set his stubble.

"Kili, why were you-" I began but was interrupted by Bombur.

"Dinner!" bellowed Bombur.

That basically triggered something like a Orcish dinner as per usual. Shoving, barging and charging were used to a great extent to get to their dinner as fast as they could. Only me, Thorin, Balin and Gandalf didn't do so as we seemed to be the only ones left with manners at all! Me and Thorin glared daggers at each other and Gandalf and Balin shook their heads. At long last the crowd around the cooking pot shrank down to Bifur and Ori and the last of us finally joined the queue for the dinner of warm stew. When I reached Bombur I held out my bowl and he smiled at me and ladled stew into my bowl.

"Thanks Bombur," I said gratefully.

"Glad yer appreciate it lass," he grinned cheerfully, "come back if your still hungry after that!"

I nodded then carefully walked over to sit next to Fili and Kili. Kili looked up when I reached them and Fili nodded and muttered 'hello' before continuing with the carving that he was doing.

"What were you REALLY betting about?" I asked randomly as I sat down. I hadn't believed Kili earlier.

Kili smirked, "you're not going to give up on that are you? Even though I told you?"

Fili looked up alarmed, "you told her!?"

"Yeah, I told her about the bet about who will get into Erebor first!"

"Oh ok," sighed Fili in relief.

"Aha!" I exclaimed, "so it wasn't what you told me it was Kili!" I had them trapped there!

"We'll yes," said Fili, "but it's something private between us." He regretted that as he watched Ristaë's face fall. We had never kept secrers from each other before.

We had never kept secrets from each other before, nor had we lied to each other. But I quickly reminded myself that they were brothers and practically entitled to have secrets between them and any jealous thoughts were banished from my mind. For now.

**This chapter kind of fan away from me so I split it into to! Sorry for the depressing flash back as well:(**


	6. Chapter 5 part 2

**Ok this is part two of chapter 5:) As always PLEASE REVIEW! It really makes my day to have a review waiting for me at the end of a very boring day of school:)**

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Most of the camp was silent and trying to get some sleep but out of the corner of my eye, I saw Bilbo get to his feet and sneak over to his pony Myrtle. Moments later she was crunching something, it was most likely to be an apple. Without warning, a scream filled with blood lust split the still silence of the night. I instantly knew what it was, there was no mistaking it, it was an Orc, most likely to be part of an Orc Pack to.

"Wh-what was t-that?" Bilbo stammered out.

"An Orc Pack," said Kili quietly. Bilbo's mouth dropped to the ground.

"Orc Pack?!" swallowed Bilbo.

"Of course! I scoffed, "what did you think would be put there? Fluffy bunnies? And before you can ask yes I do know that are rabbits out there but you know what I mean!"

"Yeah, they'll be dozens of them, the lowlands are crawling with them," said Fili matter of factly. I smirked, this was completely freaking Bilbo out.

"They strike in the small hours of the morning, no screams, just lots of blood," said Kili. The flickering of the flames illuminated his face, making him look slightly creepy. Fili, Kili and I looked at each other and chuckled, ahh what fun it was to freak Bilbo out about things he didn't know yet. It was like when we were dwarflings, always trying to annoy and irritate people as much as we could could.

"Do you think it's funny? That a night raid by Orcs is a joke?" Thorin practically had smoke coming out of his ears.

We hung our heads, "we didn't mean it like that," mumbled Kili.

"I know you didn't, you know nothing of the world," seethed Thorin and he stormed off and looked out over the lowlands.

"Don't worry about it laddie, Thorin had more cause than most to hate Orcs,"said Balin sadly.

Me, Fili and Kili all had a pretty good idea where this was heading but we didn't say anything.

"After Smaug took Erebor, King Thror tried to reclaim the ancient Halls of Moria. But our sacred halls were overrun with the most foul race in all of Middle-Earth. Orcs. Before the great gates of Moria was the battle of Azanulzibar, a bloody and gory war if ever there was one. Corpses with ripped out guts and throats lay everywhere, oozing blood and blanketed by black hordes of flies before the victim was even dead. King Thror lead his people on fearlessly, furious about the desecration of his hallowed halls. We held our own against our foe but they had a distinct advantage, Azog the Defiler. He stood over two meters in height and was a vile Gundabard Orc. Powerful and strong he wielded a monstrous mace that he used to knock down our mighty warriors before they even got close. Azog the Defiler, the Psle Orc had also sworn an oath, to air out the line of Durin. He began, by beheading the king. He threw the head at Thorin's feet. That was when I saw him, a young dwarf prince facing down the Pale Orc. His sword was quickly know led put of hand and shield had already been lost in the midst of war. He slipped and just when Azog was about to deliver a death blow he grasped an oaken branch and ousted it as a shield. He blocked further heavy blows before gripping a sword at last and sliced through the bone, skin and muscle of the Pale Orc's left arm," concluded Balin, "afterwards Thrain, Thorin's father went missing. Taken prisoner or killed we do not know."

By this time everyone was staring at Thorin with their mouths agape. Our loyalty to him had been renewed by Balin's tale. As we watched, Thorin turned around and looked at us with a deep sadness in his eyes.

"And what of the Pale Orc?" Bilbo asked somewhat eagerly.

"He slunk back into the halls whence he came, that filth died of his wounds long ago," sneered Thorin disdainfully.

Gandalf and Balin exchanged a look which made me think that that was not entirely true but I didn't say anything as I wasn't sure and didn't want to jump to the wrong conclusion.

"Everyone go to sleep, we leave at dean tomorrow, NO exceptions," ordered Thorin. Thorin's word was technically law as he was the crownless King of Erebor so everyone did so.

As I settled down between Fili and Kili, I thought of Smaug and the Quest. And whether we would ever succeed.

**So, please review as always!**


	7. Chapter 7

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**Disclaimer: As always I own nothing apart from OC'S so if you recognise anything, I don't own it!**

I woke up the next morning as dawn's rays hit my eyes. I quickly realised that me, Fili and Kili were a big tangle of arms and legs and as if that wasn't enough, some positions were slightly awkward. Kili had his arm around my waist and was holding my tightly to him and Fili had his arms round my neck and his head on my chest. In addition to that, I cringed inwardly, one of my hands was tangled in Kili's messy hair and my other arm was wrapped around Fili's broad shoulders. As I tried to untangle myself from the still sleeping brothers, I noticed that Bofur was watching me with a mischievous and sly smirk on his face. Oh Mahal! He was obviously going to tease us mercilessly for days about this because it looked 'odd' as you might say. When I was finally free, I went over to Bofur.

"Bofur, please don't mention it to anyone else," I pleaded. Bofur then inexplicably cracked up laughing.

"I don't think I'll have to! Most of us have already seen!" Bofur grinned evilly. I groaned, this was just what I needed to get kicked off this quest by Thorin. Exactly what I DIDN'T want!

"Does Thorin know?" I asked dreading the worst.

"Does Thorin know what?" asked Fili curiously from behind me. As I turned around I saw that Kili was also awake.

I sighed, "Bofur you can tell them I need to go and see to Spring." So I left Bofur to explain what we had been talking about. As I watched from where Spring was tethered, I could see the brother's faces turning a shade of red I RFID t think a dwarf could turn.

After breakfast we set out and I had to reassure Thorin that the position that we had assumed that morning were done entirely in subconsciousness when we were sleeping. He nodded slowly.

"I hope you're telling the truth, I will not have you be a distraction to them."

I sighed in relief as our ponies slowly plodded along. Just as I was back next to Fili and Kili, the clouds opened and huge sheets of rain began tumbling down and completely soaking us within seconds. After a few minutes, Dori's self control broke.

"Mr Gandalf! Can you do something about this deluge?"

"It is raining Master Dwarf and it will continue to rain until the rain is done," replied Gandalf matter of factly, "if you wish to change the weather of this world then I suggest you sing yourself another wizard."

"Are there any?" asked Bilbo curiously after a few minutes of silence and bone chilling rain.

"Any what?" said Gandalf who had lost the thread of previous conversation.

"Other wizards," repeated Bilbo.

"Ah yes," said Gandaf who now understood what he was talking about, "there are five of us. Saruman the White, two blue wizards do you know I've quite forgotten their names and Radaghast, Radaghast the Brown."

"Are they very great wizards, or are they more like you?" said the ever inquisitive Bilbo. I snorted, that was the first insult I'd ever heard against Gandalf. Ever. Gandf was obviously affronted as he huffed a bit before answering.

"I think that are very great wizards, each in their own way. For example Radaghast looks over the vast forest lands of Greenwood the Great, a good thing to ad always evil will seek to gain a foothold in this land."

The rain still hadn't stopped.

_**Time skip**_

Once again Thorin kept us moving until the last possible moment so when we eventually stopped, dusk had fallen and it lay like a blanket around us.

"We will stay here for the night," decided Thorin as he stood in front of a ramshackle hut that had fallen into disrepair. We nodded and began to dismount and unpack the necessary items for the night. Gandalf examined the hut with a disapproving expression on his wrinkled face.

"I think it would be wiser to move on," frowned Gandalf. Everone but Thorin groaned, we'd only just stopped and now we might have to move on for Mahal knows more hours.

"No, we'll stay here tonight," Thorin retorted. They then proceeded to go in the hut and argue fiercely. After a few minutes, Gandalf stormed out.

"I've had enough of dwarves for one day!" he muttered angrily under his breath but still loud enough for us to hear. I raised an eyebrow, so he had just encountered Thorin's legendary temper then. Bilbo watched Gandalf disappear into the forest with a worried look on his face.

"Will he come back?" asked Bilbo anxiously.

"I hope so laddie but he is a wizard remember," replied Balin.

Yeah, a fat lot of good it would do us if Gsmdalf never appeared again. Who would keep Thorin under control? It certainly wouldn't be me. Maybe Dwalin would be able to as one of oldest friends. Just like last night, we untacked the ponies and tied them up. As soon as that was done, Thorin ordered his nephews to:

"Watch the ponies!"

They sighed and rolled their eyes but obeyed their uncle and sat down on a log and kept watch whilst quietly charting to pass the time.

"Ristaë," Thorin said my name as if it were poison, "you set up their bedrolls."

I immediately bristled at this but he glared at me and I decided that maybe I shouldn't risk it. So I found the brother's blue bedrolls and laid them out along with one on a flat, not stony patch if land by the warm fire.

Eventually, dinner was ready and Bofur told me and Bilbo to take Fili and Kili their dinners before coming back and eating ours. As we carefully picked our way through the undergrowth, Bilbo repeatedly nearly dropped Kili's. The journey seemed to last forever in the dark when it really only lasted a minute or two. When we reached them I immediately knew something was wrong. For a start, they were standing ramrod straight and staring at the ponies.

"Err, hello?" I called out to them hesitantly. Neither of them answered and Kili used his hand to beckon us closer. "What is it?" I asked in hushed tones.

"We've, umm, encountered a slight problem," mumbled Fili.

"We had 16 ponies, but now there's..."

"14," I finished for Kili doing a quick head count of the ponies. I rolled my eyes, only Fili and Kili could loose two ponies whilst keeping watch over them. Actually, maybe their 'watching skills' weren't so great. We walked through the ponies to determine who was missing.

"Daisy and Bungo are missing," clarified Fili. I sighed in relief, at least it wasn't Spring. Yet.

"I wonder who took them. Or where they went mused Bilbo thoughtfully.

"Well actually as our official burglar we thought that you might want to look into it," said Kili.

Bilbo gulped, "umm," he said as he looked around with inexperienced eyes at the 'crime' scene Tot find some clues. Eventually, he found the recently uprooted tree that me, Fili and Kili were staring at rather pointedly. "Well it looks like something big uprooted this tree," Bilbo stated the obvious.

"No kidding," I said sarcastically.

"Yeah that was our reckoning," said Fili sardonically.

"And possibly quite dangerous," added Bilbo as we hunted for further clues.

"Hey look! There's a light!" hissed Fili excitedly. Everyone turned their heads to where he was pointing. Sure enough, an orange light blazed surrounded by two hulking shapes. We quickly darted closer to investigate. As we peered around a tree, another large shape lumbered forth from where the ponies were tethered. Aha, so this jaws what had been taking the ponies! He had more of our ponies under his arms this time. Trolls.

"He's got Myrtle and Minty!" whispered Bilbo in annoyance, "we have to get them back!"

"Yes, yes you should!" Kili whispered back. Bilbo tried to protest but found himself stumbling towards the ponies held captive by the trolls.

I watched Bilbo stealthily make his way past the trolls before I turned to Fili and Kili with a furious glare on my face.

"What do you think you're doing?!" I hissed angrily.

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	8. Chapter 8

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**Disclsimer: I own nothing apart from Ristaë! Even then I suppose she's a free person!;)**

"Buying time to get the others," said Kili guiltily. It was a valid point but I still found it unacceptable to let defenceless Bilbo go in the vicinity of the revolting trolls. I mean, he didn't even have a knife!

"Well then what are we waiting for?" I snapped.

"Nothing, nothing," Fili said hurriedly as he began racing back towards camp with Kili and I hot on his heels. We burst into camp hollering for them to arm themselves and follow us and fast as they could. They did so without hesitation fast everyone sprinted back into the woods. Well, nearly all of us, Bombur kind of waddled as quickly as he could. By the time we reached the trolls, Bilbo was being held by one and had somehow been covered in slimy troll snot and bogeys.

"Ewwwww," I groaned in disgust. Thank Mahal that it wasn't me up there, Ori was the only one who heard me and looked faintly green himself.

"One, two, three," Thorin muttered, "Kili go now." Kili leapt into the middle of the trolls without worry for his at all.

"Drop him!" he growled as he swung his sword threateningly.

"You what?" said the one holding Bilbo stupidly.

"I said, drop him," Kili repeated louder this time. The troll snarled and flung Bilbo at Kili with such force that Kili fell flat on his back with Bilbo on top of him. I heard him moan slightly, poor Kili, he certainly hasn't expected that! At that, the rest of us jumped out of our hiding places with drawn and raised weapons. Axes, swords, staffs, in our company there was a huge variety of weaponry. My weapons of choice were a bow and arrow like Kili, though mine were slightly more elven in style. That was mainly to bug Thorin as he detested elves and boy did it work! For now though, I used my long dual knives. Dwarven fighting against larger foes is very energetic. We stand on each other's shoulders in order to reach higher up to more vulnerable places like the throat. As I darted around the trolls legs stabbing and slashing, I quickly remember that troll skin was incredibly tough. My blades had been forged with the help of an elf that I had travelled with for a year or two and he had imbued them with some elvish strength which had greatly enhanced their power. Even so, I hadn't managed to do much damage to the grotesque trolls other than a deepish cut across the stomach of the one with the squeaky voice. They were slow and lumbering so we were fairly easily able to evade their clumsy lunges at us. After several well aimed blows to the foot from Dwalin, the trolls fought back with renewed vigour. Suddenly, in the midst of battle, they caught hold of Bilbo. I was just about to swing with all of my strength at a knobbly knee when-

"Lay down your arms, or we'll rip his off!" the fat one growled menacingly. I looked up and saw Bilbo suspended in midair with a troll holding an arm and a leg with another troll doing the same on his other side. Bilbo looked at us pleadingly. Thorin closed his eyes and sighed, then he threw down his sword. Everyone else followed suit and reluctantly laid down their weapons. Before I took off my quiver I tucked the knives back in to stop them getting lost. Within a few minutes if our blackmailed surrender, we found our selves in sacks or on a spit over the fire. Unfortunately, I was one of the unlucky ones and was tied on the crudely made spit. As they argued about how to cook us, I could feel my skin slowly blistering as I and the others bound up on the spit were slowly turned around and around and around and around.

"Stop!" blurted out Bilbo hastily, "you are making a terrible mistake!" We all yelled stuff back like 'well duh!' and 'obviously!' Bofur yelled out the most memorable thing which was: "you can't reason with them, their half wits!"

"And what does that make us?" I yelled back to indignant objections.

"Shud up!" grumbled the troll who was slower roasting us, "I can't stand your squeaky voices!"

"Same," agreed the other two in unison.

"I mean with the cooking," continued Bilbo.

"Well I was just gonna roast 'em and season them with sage," said one troll.

Bilbo shook his head, "oh no, you're going to need something a lot stronger than sage! I mean, have you smelt them?"

That was crossing the line, how dare he! Me and especially Thorin yelled out how badly we thought HE stank. With some colourful language included of course!

"The secret to cooking dwarf is..." said Bilbo, ignoring our outrage at his insults. The trolls looked at Bilbo eagerly, desperate to hear Bilbo's secret. Wait a minute, how did he even KNOW the so called secret? Did he cook dwarves himself?

"Well go on then! What's the secret?" asked a troll impatiently.

"Err, the secret is... To skin them first!" concluded Bilbo. Despite his hesitation at saying the secret, I still though t that he cooked dwarves at his home. One of the trolls picked up Bombur by his legs and dangled him there upside down.

"Tom," he said, Ghent me the filleting knife." Bombur wriggled and tried desperately to get free but failed miserably. My skin was now really blistered and painful.

"No! Not that one! He's infected, he's got worms... In his tubes," squeaked Bilbo. The troll threw him down in disgust. "In fact they all do," said Bilbo, "you know, absolutely riddled with parasites."

"OI!" yelled Gloin, "we don't have parasites, you have parasites!"

"Yeah!" I shouted back, "you're the one riddled with them!" I then heard the sound of a foot connecting with a head, then silence apart from the creaking of a still turning spit. I now felt very dizzy.

"I've got parasites as big as my arm!" yelled Oin first. What was he on about? Chaos then erupted and everyone was screaming about how big their 'parasites' were. I could distinctively hear Kili broadening that he had the biggest parasites of anyone. So I decided to join in.

"My parasites are indestructible!" I shrieked.

"The dawn shall take you all!" yelled a vaguely familiar voice though I couldn't sed who it was.

"Who's he?" wondered a troll.

"No idea," said another, "d'you think we can eat him to?"

There was then a huge crack and sunlight flooded the small clearing. A of the trolls groaned and it sounded like stones were being grated together in a deafening . Then cheering grime out from the dwarves go commas see what was happening. We dwarves on the spit strained against our bonds to see what had happened.

"What's happened?" I asked loudly to no one in particular. Bilbo heard and hopped over to me still tied up in his sack.

"The trolls were turned to stone when Gandalf split a boulder!" declared Bilbo happily.

"Do can you let me down?" I asked hopefully.

"I will once I'm free," answered Bilbo.

"C'me here Bilbo, I'll get you out of there," said Fili. Bilbo sighed in relief and about 10 seconds later the sound of roping cloth was heard. Then I could hear water being poured under me accompanied by a hissing. A brief envelope of whiteness covered me as steam from the now extinguished fire. As the steam cleared, I saw that Kili was climbing up the spit to cut me free from it. When he did so, he forgot to hold of my hand and I tumbled off the spit to the still swarm ashes below. I landed with a splat and ash billowed up into the faces of nearby dwarves and they started spluttering. I instinctively held my breath, closed my eyes and started crawling in a direction that I hoped was away from the ash. Thankfully I didn't need to crawl for long before I was out of the ash and breathing fresh air.

"Umm Taë are you ok?" asked Kili nervously.

"I've been better," I said as I got to my feet and started dusting ash off my clothes.

"So your not mad at me for not holding onto your hand?"

"Not particularly," I said dryly, "'cause I know just the way to get my revenge." Kili gulped, one of my childhood revenges had been filling his bed with red ants because he had stolen my toy sword. He had got bitten every night for about two weeks.

"Come on!" said Thorin, "we need to go and get our stuff, tack up the ponies and investigate the possibility of a troll hoard. So I suggest we get moving."

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	9. Chapter 9

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Everyone stared at the troll hoard with sleeves over their noses and mouths. It absolutely STANK of everything from 100 tyrant old toilets to Oliphant poo. From Orc breath to decomposing Wargs. It was so bad that even Thorin covered his nose and mouth against the putrid smell.

"Are you sure you still want to go in there?" I asked Thorin in a sleeve muffled voice.

"Yes, its only a smell, it won't kill us."

"Or will it?" I mumbled back as Thorin ventured into the vile smelling cave. The stench was even worse on the inside and Bilbo started retching in the corner which nearly set everyone else off to as we were fighting to keep down breakfast.

"Shut. Up,"scowled Thorin with what little of his face showed from under his sleeve. From what could see, Thorin looked like he had a faintly green palor to his face himself. And who was it who said its only a smell'? Hmm of was Thirinsorin's and now Thorin looked like he was toning uo throw up. Ahh what fun it would be to tease Thorin about this at a more appropriate time.

In the hoard I found one thing I wanted. It was a deep blue aquamarine gem on a mithril chain. I hadn't seen anything so pretty since my mother's wedding ring of plaited bands of gold and silver inlaid with rubies, emeralds, sapphires and diamonds. It was currently sitting in a box in my room along with the other treasured remains of my mother to give to my daughter for her wedding. Some of the others were taking things so I decided to go ahead and pocketed the beautiful necklace. After that, I could feel my self control over my stomach slowly slipping more and more as I felt increasingly more queasy so I carefully made my way out of the stolen treasures if the troll hoard to fresh air once more. Once outside, I inhaled huge lungfuls of fresh, untainted air and waited for the other Dwarves to get bored of the large hoard with Bilbo.

Typically, they lingered in the hoard for another half-hour until they were either overwhelmed by the stench, or simply got bored of gazing at treasures that were easily surpassed in the vaults of Erebor. Bilbo emerged first clutching a small sword in his hand. Well, very small to humans and elves, shortish to medium for a dwarf and the perfect size for a hobbit.

"So you're armed now Master Hobbit," I said to him stating the obvious.

"Yes, Gandalf fit f it for me in the troll hoard," Bilbo replied.

"Is it an Elven blade?" I asked him curiously.

"Umm yes and apparently it will glow blue when Orcs or Goblins are near by."

I nodded in approval, and indeed it would be for giving us an early warning on approaching enemies. After a minute or two, everyone else cane put of the cave with Thorin and Gandalf both holding new swords in dusty scabbards. Elven swords if I was correct though why would Thorin have an elven sword? Indeed, why would he have a sword that wasn't dwarven? He hated rlves and was incredibly proud of his culture. Thorin had just opened his mouth to speak when a rustling noise sounded. Loud and menacing and definitely coming our way. We all tensed and drew our weapons preparing to fight an enemy once more. The noise grew louder and louder until its source burst from the bushes in s flurry of leaves. I gaped in shock, what stood before us was a man on a sled pulled by RABBITS! Giant rabbits pulling a sled. I think I'm going mad. The man stood taller than a dwarf but at least a hand and a half shorter than Gandalf. He had bird poo down the side one his face and dressed in an odds variety of furs, cloth and leather. All topped off with a bushy extremely unkept beard and a ragged hat a bit like Bofur's.

"Radaghast!" exclaimed Gandalf in surprise, "what on earth are you doing here?"

"Well I was looking for you Gandalf," Radaghast said gravely, "I needed to talk to you." We all strained our ears to try to hear what was being said. Gandalf sighed and lead Radaghast off to talk to him in private away from our inquisitive ears.

"So that was the wizard Gandalf was talking about?" Fili asked in astonishment to no one in particular.

"I guess..." replied Kili who was staring at the sled rather than the wizard becaus it was being pulled by giant RABBITS!

"Rabbits? Pulling a sled? Now that's something you don't see everyday," I said to the brothers as everyone stared fixated on the very oversized rabbits. Then without the slightest bit of warning, a low growl emanated from above us. A warg. Kili and I both shot instinctively and two dwarven arrows embedded themselves in the warg's chest with a sickening squelch. It tumbled down and landed by Thorin's iron toed boots and he finished it off by slicing his new elven sword across it's exposed throat splitting the jugular vein and instantly ending its lowly life.

"A warg scout," spat Thorin venomously, "which means an Orc Pack is not far behind."

"We need to get out of here," Balin voiced our thoughts.

"We can't! The ponies have bolted!" yelled a dismayed Ori from where the ponies were.

"All except Spring," added Gandalf, "Ristaë you must gallop to Rivendell and alert Lord Elrond, you know where it is."

Thank Mahal I had visited Rivendell with my elf companion Zéo when we had travelled together. I nodded and mounted Spring who shifted underneath me as if she knew we had a gallop ahead of us. Kili grabbed my arm.

"Be careful," he said.

"Please," said Dwalin with worry in his eyes.

Then we were galloping. We hadn't galloped so fast for ages, this time lives really did depend on this race for the companies lives. We sped across the barren planes avoiding the large chunks of rock that loomed over us. Suddenly, the howling of wargs was heard, then the rhythmic thudding of horse's hooves. Orcs didn't use horses did they? Though the Ring Wraiths of old did though they had been unheard of since the War of The Ring. As I created the small hill, I saw what had made the hoofbeats, about 15 elves stood by their horses as they looked at the ground for something.

"Help! My ravelling companions are being chased by Orcs! You must help!" I cried as loudly as I could. They stared at me.

"We are tracking an Orc Pack at the moment," said one slowly. Hang on, I recognised that voice! It was Lord Elrond is I wasn't mistaken.

"Lord Elrond," I said looking him squarely in the eyes, "you must come, and quickly!"

"Ristaë," he said staring at me, "we will come. The other elves stared at me in shock, how did Elrond know me? A dwarf of all races to! Nevertheless, they mounted their horses with Elrond and started galloping towards me so I swiftly wheeled Spring around and kicked her back into a gallop. Poor Spring had just galloped long and hard but my faithful friend galloped no slower than before, in fact she galloped even faster! The warg howls were heard again this time with shrieks of orc and warg agony, the company was obviously managing to kill off a few of the foul beasts quite painfully. The elves behind me sped up and easily overtook me in s galloping rush of tails and hooves. They knocked arrows to their bows and loosened their swords in their scabbards and one of them blew a long clear note into a horn. The orcs froze and frantically tried to regroup themselves shah at the immortal elves. As the elves distracted the Orc Pack, the dwarves quickly jumped down a tunnel with Gandalf in the lead behind a boulder. Spring couldn't go down there and there was no way in Middle Earth that I would leave her behind. Dwarven ponies live as long as dwarves so we usually only owned one pony in our lives that we raised and trained ourselves. I looked around for Lord Elrond.

"Ristaë," he said from behind me and I jumped about 10 foot in the air in surprise. Sprin merely flicked her ear in annoyance. "They have gone down the hidden path to Imladris, come with us and meet them their."

"Really?" I asked.

"Yes, definitely," Elrond confirmed, "come." He turned his horse earphone and gestures for me and the elves to follow him back to Rivendell. We galloped yet again but slower this time because of Spring even though Elrond had given her some extra energy Mao that she could make it to Rivendell without collapsing. Despite the extra energy, I could really feel her flagging beneath me.

When we finally reached the Hidden Valley, I managed to spot a cluster of short people with bushy beards and tangled hair. Do the dwarves did make it to Rivendell after all, that was relief and a half! We cantered down to them and they immediately closed ranks, even the dwarves that didn't have a grudge against elves. That made me think that Thorin had something to do with it. As I was riding at the back, they hadn't seen me yet. When Elrond and the elves cantered in a circle around them, they bunched together even more until they saw me and visibly relaxed even though they stayes indefensve positions with raised weapons.

"Can we trust them?! Can we trust then Ristaë?!" demanded Thorin.

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	10. Chapter 10

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"Does he offer us insult?!" Gloin growled.

"No Master Gloin he's offering you food and shelter," Gandalf said quickly before things could turn nasty.

"Oh, right," he coughed awkwardly, "well, in that case lead on!"

Elrond nodded, "follow me," and gracefully dismounted his horse before passing the reins to Lindir. Kili, Fili and my father smiled at me as they followed Elrond, relieved I was back unharmed.

"Lindir, is it ok if I take Spring to the stable she used last time?" I asked him as Spring looked at me imploringly with weary eyes.

"Yes, there are already oats in the manger to," he replied in assent. As for water in an elven stable, well, running through the back of the stable block was a small, pure stream to supply water to all of the horses without fail. It also saved the elves the job if having to refil water buckets twice a day as well. I lead Spring down the twisting paths if Rivendell towards where I hoped was the stable block. Luckily, I had remembered the way correctly. After navigating the elegant paths with staues carved out of stone, the familiar entrance to the stable appeared around the bend. Spring pricked up her ears, happy she could finally rest and eat. There weren't any doors in Rivendell so we just walked straight in and to that stall that Spring had occupied previously. She made a beeline for the manger and was scoffing oats before I could even take off her bridle. I shut the door of the stall so Spring wouldn't go off a wandering around Rivendell unchecked. After untacking her, I refilled the mm anger which was already empty with more oats and dumped her tack and the stuff she had been carrying outside the stable. Then I stroked her neck for a while and went to have a bath.

The bathrooms were large rooms with baths set down into the floor so that you had to step into them. There were three bathrooms, unisex, male and female. I could hear the dwarves in the unisex room, that meant that there was at least one elf in the male room. Typical Thorin, I still had modesty and I was of the opposite gender to them so I went into the female room. It was empty but I pulled the screen around a small bath in the corner of the room for privacy. I stripped off my clothes and slipped into the bath and let the past few weeks worth of grime and sweat slowly wash away. I was nearly nodding off when I heard a voice from behind the screen, thank Mahal it seemed to be a female!

"Ristaë, when was the last time you wore a dress?" TThe voice asked, elven and strangely familiar.

"Wh-what? H-hey!" I gasped scrambling out of the bath and quickly wrapping a towel around me.

"Are you decent?" the elf asked.

I spluttered, "we'll if you count only wearing a towel as decent then yes I suppose I am."

"Good," the elf said and came around the screen. I backed into the corner in total shock, "'cause I think you'd look nice in this one." When the elf stood in front of me I calmed down straight away, it was Kyza, the elf that is made friend with last time I was here.

"Kyza! It's great to see you again!" I grinned.

"It's nice to see you again to, to be honest I never thought I actually would," Kyza replied, "now about the dress-"

"Why do I need to wear it?" I interrupted.

"Because," she said fixing me with a steely glare. I sighed and resigned myself to my fate. Kyza could be even more stubborn than Thorin if he wanted, I had learnt that the hard way.

"Fine, fine... But if its too girly then no way am I wearing it," I agreed reluctantly.

"Ok then!" Kyza beamed in triumph, "you change into that one and I'll go and get the others." Other dresses? I gulped, this didn't found very good. None the less, I obeyed my friend and put the dress on. It was a kind of greeny-grey-blue similar to my eyes and had quite a high neckline. At least she had remembered that I detested the popular low necklines of Rivendell. The shape of the fess didn't have any sharp angles and reached to about half way down my shins. The actual dress was surprisingly comfy, not itchy, not heavy, just THERE.

"You done yet?" Kyza called through the screen.

"Yes," I called back and she came back around the screen into my view again. She was holding more dresses but she put them down when she saw me.

"Perfect," Kyza smiled, "now for the hair, maybe you could do something else with it?"

"I'll retry the braids but that's it," I replied flatly, my mother had done most of them and I had just redone them when they had become loose.

"Ok, ok," Kyza tutted and set to work in my hair, reordering it just how I'd asked. After only about fine minutes she was done and she told me to find the dinner table.

"What about my clothes?" I asked her, gesturing at my travelling clothes.

"I'll clean them then return them to you," she smiled.

"Thanks," I replied then went to find dinner. I didn't have any boots so I walked barefoot, the cool flagstone floors smooth against my feet, a welcome change from my boots. I found dinner by found alone, dwarves could be heard from leagues away. Before I went to the table I listened to some of the liking music to soothe my nerves slightly, then I took a deep breath and walked towards the space by Fili and Kili. My father was the first one to notice me so he got up and enveloped me in a huge bear hug. I hugged him tightly back, so many dangers awaited us in this quest, more than anyone could even begin to imagine.

"I'm so glad you weren't hurt," he murmured to me.

"I'm glad none of you were hurt to," I replied in a muffled voice and Dwalin released me from the hug.

"Is that a dress you're wearing?" asked Kili in mock amazement, he studies the dress more carefully, "an elven dress?"

"Yes, it's the same one I wore last time," I said.

"Last time? You've been here before?!" blazed Thorin glaring at me as he pushed his chair back and got to his feet.

** I had to cut it here otherwise the chapter would have been much longer.**

**I'm going to Spain on Friday so don't expect any updates for at least two weeks after Friday... But I will try to update as much as possible until Friday:) See ya!**


	11. Chapter 11

**Hi thanks sooooooooooo much to my followers/favouriters/reviewers!**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing apart from Ristaë!**

"Yes, I came here when I was travelling with Zéo."

"What race was he?" Thorin demanded. The look on my face must have given it all away, "gah! An elf?! Oh Mahal of all the races an elf!" He threw his hands up in disgust and stormed away closely followed by Dwalin who shot me an apologetic look. All of the other dwarves were staring at me in disbelief.

"You travelled with an ELF?!" Fili spat the last word disdainfully.

"Yes," I said simply.

"Why?"

"He saved me from three wargs that had cornered me by a wall and disarmed me," I shrugged, "we just never left each other."

"Wait, that sounds like you had something going on between you," Fili narrowed his eyes and the others did the same, listening closely to the interrogation.

"No!" I growled fiercely, "that would never happen! We were friends thats all!"

"Good, an elf and a dwarf..." Gloin shuddered. Dwalin and Thorin returned, Thorin still had a sullen angry look on his face. No doubt directed at me.

"What realm did the elf come from?" hissed Thorin.

I frowned as I tried to remember, "Mirk-Mirkwood I think." Thorin practically face palmed himself, then I remembered, Mirkwood was the realm that King Thranduil ruled over. King Thranduil was the king who had abandoned King Thror when Smaug had attacked Erebor. How could I have forgotten that?

"He was an elf. From Mirkwood. Nothing could be a worse travelling companion," said Thorin struggling to keep his voice steady. I just shrugged and Brahman eating my dinner, it was only then that I noticed that only one or two of the dwarves had tried the food in front of them. It only being fruit and vegetables I can't say I wasn't surprised. I had become accustomed to fruit and veg whilst I had travelled and of course, being a hobbit Bilbo was already helping himself to seconds. With the initial shock of me over the dwarves started complaining about the food.

"Where's the meat?" said Dwalin rummaging through the bowls of lettuce and stuff like that in the hope of finding meat underneath it. The elves pointedly ignored him and continued aying their harps and flutes. I looked down the table and saw Thorin, Gandalf and Elrond in deep conversation. Elrond and Gandalf were both holding swords so I assumed that was what they were talking about. Dori was one of the only dwarves eating the elven food and was urging the others to at least try a little bit.

"That's me done," I said once I was full, "I'm going to explore for a bit." I stretched my arms above my head and got to my feet. Kili was still poking his food suspiciously. "You might as well try it, it isn't as bad as it looks," I told him.

"Really?" he raised his eye brows sceptically.

"Yes," I replied, "see you later," and walked eagerly over to an unfamiliar doorway across the courtyard. It opened up onto a wide corridor fringed with tall and slender trees on either side with branches that entwined with the opposite tree to create an archway. I looked up in wonder when I realised that the finger like branches were interlocked in a simple braid pattern! How the elves had managed at do that I would never know... The corridor suddenly widened out and became a balcony. I stood by the barrier at the edge if the balcony and gazed out over Imladris. It's beauty still stole my breath away. Below me numerous waterfalls cascaded down to the floor of the valley that I had never explored last time in a mass of foam. Lush green vegetation carpeted the valley, home to all sorts of wildlife. Was there a way to get down there? I looked around the balcony and in the corner a spied a set of steps that lead downwards. I ran over to them to investigate further and discovered that they lead all the way down to the valley floor! I was just about to start down them when I suddenly sensed a presence behind me. I spun around and saw only Kili who was watching me.

"Please don't sneak up on me like that!" I gasped in shock.

"Where are you going?" Kili asked me curiously.

"Oh I'm going to explore down there," I explained gesturing with my hand, "you can come with me if you want."

"Ok," he shrugged somewhat too casually, "are you sure that those steps are safe?"

"Well, no but they look it," I mumbled.

"Then what are we waiting for?" he grinned, "lets go!" We carefully made our way down the steps. They lead us on a gently curving path behind waterfalls that cast dancing shadows in the light and the clay nests of swallows. I looked down and immediately felt slightly dizzy.

"Kili."

"Yes?"

"Don't look down."

"Why?" there was a small pause, "ah, I see why..."

"You looked down didn't you."

"...Yes.

I sighed in exasperation, did he ever do as he was told if it wasn't Thorin ordering to do it? I didn't think so. We eventually reached the bottom and our feet touched safe ground once again. I looked back up at the way we had come, it was going to take a while to get back up to the top alright.

"It's going to be a looooong trek back up," said Kili voicing my thoughts. I diverted my attention from the depressingly large set of steps to the waterfalls. The pools at the bottom of them were a heaving mass of foam and spray.

"Beautiful," I breathed, "just beautiful."

"Like you," said Kili from next to me and I looked at him con confusion. Hiseveral was only a few inches away from mine, a bit closer than I had expected. That was... unexpected.

"Ummmmmmm... Kili...?" I said slowly, what in Middle Earth was he doing?! He shook his head slightly and moved even closer to me. My feet remained glued to the ground and ignored my brain telling them to move. Slowly, ever so slowly, he touched his lips to mine and kissed me.

**So they kissed! Kinda. Mwahahahahahahaha! A big of an evil cliffhanger I know but I will try to update by Friday because on Friday I'm going away for two weeks ands won't have any Wifi so I won't be able to update!**

**Please R and R! **


	12. PLEASE READ

**Hey guys! I'm sorry this isn't an update but it is a question! I know it seems quite early to be asking but do you think that Kili, Fili and Thorin should die in this? Should only one of them die? Please please please please please please leave a review or PM on your opinion! I will decide may the the majority! Please please do so!**

**See ya!**


	13. Chapter 13

**:) Thank you followers/reviewers/favouriters!'**

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything but OCs! Never have never will!**

His lips were warm and oddly comforting. Then it sunk in, Kili, one of my best friends, was kissing me. No. Way. I swiftly broke the kiss and stared at him disbelief, he stared at me in discombobulation.

"Why?" I whispered.

"I...I-" began Kili, not understanding that it was more of a rhetorical question. I shook my head to try to clear it of the thoughts that were swimming around in it and took off back up the many steps, leaving Kili at the bottom of them. Alone.

Despite my aching and protesting legs, I didn't stop running until I reached the top of the steps where I collapsed into a heap. As I wheezed and tried to catch my breath and ignore my parched throat for now I ran through the previous few minutes events. Why had Kili done that? I wracked by mind to try to come up with an answer and failed. The only way I would know would be to ask Kili himself and there was no way I was doing that. In the end I decided to just forget about it and pretend it had never happened. I nodded to myself and got to my feet, maybe it would be a good idea to go to my room. Not that I knew where it was, though it would probably be the room that I had occupied last time. I made my way back down the corridor to the courtyard were we had eaten, no one was left in there and the table had been cleared.

"Hello?" I called put tentatively.

"Miss Ristaë?" said an elf from behind me, making me jump.

"Mahal!" I cried, "why does everyone keep on sneaking up on me?"

"Do you want to know where your room is?" the elf asked holding her hands up in surrender.

"How did you know?" I asked suspiciously.

"I can read people's minds," the elf replied matter of factly.

I raised an eyebrow, "ookk, yes please then."

"If you would follow me then." I followed the elf back through the courtyard and into another beautiful passage, this time with pale wood doors on either side. We reached a door with the number '12' engraved at the eye level of an elf. I had to crane my head right up to see that the numbers were carved to look like trees growing into numbers entangled with ivy.

"This is where you'll be staying until you and the rest of the dwarves leave," the elf told me.

"What about the others? Where are they staying?" I asked her.

"They'll be staying in rooms with their family within the group," she replied.

She was just about to leave when I asked her what her name was.

"Fai, my name is Fai," she replied before gracefully walking away. I pushed open the door and entered my room. It was slightly different to the one I had had last time though it still had the sand facilities. Laid out on the bed were my travelling clothes, clean and fresh smelling once more. I looked out of the window and saw that the sky was darkening and the sun was setting in a haze of soft orangey hued colours. Wow, we had been in Rivendell longer than I had thought. As I turned away from the window I tripped over the hem of my dress and nearly fell flat on my face. I gritted my teeth, I was changing out of this dress. Now.

I was looking through the bookshelf in the corner of the room when I heard it. Bong! Bong! Bong! I pricked my ears, the dinner gong! I sprinted to the door and wrenched it open and the froze as still as ice in midwinter. Kili was standing in front of my door with his hand raised like he was about to knock on thin air.

"Errrr... Hi," I mumbled awkwardly.

"Ummm... I-I errr... Want to apologise for earlier. I shouldn't have done it, we haven't seen each other for ten years after all," Kili gabbled uncomfortably. My feet suddenly became very interesting.

"No, you shouldn't have done it. I value your friendship Kili, and I don't want it to be complicated," I explained to him.

"I know that now but I couldn't help it Taë! And then when you ran away... It hurt," said Kili sadly.

"Does Fili know about it?" I asked unexpectedly, the thought only just occurring to me.

"Yyeesss," Kili elongated the word as he said it. I sighed, I hoped Fili wouldn't tease about it. Though there wasn't much to tease me about there was plenty to tease Kili about.

"Oh well," I sighed, "why don't we just forget what happened and not mention it again?"

Kili exhaled in relief, "that's exactly what I was hoping you'd say! So, shall we go to dinner?" My stomach growled loudly. "I'll take that as a yes then!" he chuckled. I nodded sheepishly and we walked back down the corridor chatting and joking as normal.

"Hey, do you know how long we're staying here?" I questioned Kili as he WAS Thorin's nephew after all.

"Well, Thorin hasn't said anything yet but I think he's talking with Elrond and Gandalf later about the map," he replied.

"But will he?" I wondered out loud, "you know what he's like about elves."

"But he wants to know what the map says," he pointed out.

"Hmmmmm..." I mused. By this time we had reached the courtyard, it was empty though the table was full of more elven food. "I don't think that the others know about the dinner gong," I laughed.

"Let's tuck in anyway," grinned Kili, "Bombur ate most of it last time." so we sat down and started eating.

"So you like this food now?" I said in amusment.

"Well, I don't love it and I don't hate it," he mumbled with his mouth full. We heard footsteps and looked up to see everyone apart from Bilbo, Balin and Thorin come into the courtyard grumbling about not knowing about the dinner gong.

"I mean, why didn't you tell us Taë?" complained Dwalin.

"Sorry, I completely forgot," I replied sheepishly. Fili waggled his eyebrows at me and Kili but we glared at him. He either ignored the glares or didn't understand them as he sat down next to Kili smirking somewhat evilly.

"So Taë, why did you run from Ki? Was he a bad kisser or something?" Fili smirked. I flushed a deep red and Kili went a shade deeper than me. Fili laughed in delight at our embarrassment and was about to say something else but I stopped him.

"Fili," I said through gritted teeth, "it was a mistake, it shouldn't have happened, please don't mention it."

"Ok," he shrugged them broke out into a smile again, "it was fun watching your reactions anyway! Oh and Kili, it doesn't count as part of the bet." As soon as those last few words were out of his mouth he looked like he could have slapped himself hard across the face.

"Bet? What bet? Another bet?! Hang on, that doesn't count as part of the bet... You were talking about the kiss... You bet on whether me and Kili would kiss?!" I exclaimed. They squirmed in their seats under my glare which confirmed what I had accused them of. I gaped at them open mouthed and rendered speechless for a few seconds. "You little... So that's what you were REALLY betting about!" I shook my head angrily.

"Taë it wasn't exactly like that!" Fili said quickly.

"Oh yeah? Then it must be worse than I thought!" I hissed at them pouring all of my anger and hurt into the words. How dare they bet about me! It was umacceptable! I stormed away from the table ignoring the stares from all of the other dwarves and barged past Thorin, Bilbo and Balin who were just coming into the courtyard who looked at me questioningly. I opened my bedroom door and slammed it shut behind me. I threw myself down on the bed and buried my face in my hands. If I didn't wear off some rage soon then I would break something. I grabbed my bow and quiver from the chair and headed to the archery range which I thankfully knew the way to.

**Yeah, this will be my last update for two weeks as I'm going on holiday but I will write during it! So see you soon! **

**Ps: I hope this isn't too much if a cliffhanger!**


	14. Chapter 14

**Hellooooooooooooo! I'm back! I wrote while I was away and I managed to get to nearly the end I'd the first movie:) Anyway, here's the chapter!**

**Thank you sooo much to my reviewers/followers and favouriters!**

**Disclaimer: As always I own nothing apart from OCs!**

I shot arrow after arrow into the dummies of goblins, orcs and wargs, venting my fury and refilling my quiver every time it emptied. I had been firing for so long that I felt my fingers blistering and becoming increasingly painful to draw back the bowstring with. I ignored the pain and kept on firing until my fingertips slipped on my bowstring which was inexplicably slick with liquid. Water? It wasn't raining and I didn't think that my fingertips sweated. I looked at the bowstring and immediately felt stupid. The pale braided horse hair was now stained with my dark red blood. My fingertips were raw and blood oozed out of the ragged skin. I groaned and sat down heavily. For some reason I was quick to anger today, and Fili and Kili's antics weren't exactly helping.

"Taë are you ok?" a familiar gruff voice said from behind me.

"If I tell you what's wrong," I hesitated, "can you promise not to tell anyone?"

"Of course," said a harmonious voice that nearly soothed my worries away. Me and Dwalin jumped in shock and stared up at the voice's owner. Long slender limbs, pale unblemished skin; eyes as old as time itself.

"Lady Galadriel," I breathed in awe and shifted into a kneeling position with my head bowed. I nudged Dwalin to do the same. He did so very unwillingly as he knew the erethral bring was an elf, the race he openly despised the most after orcs, goblins and dragons.

"Who are you?" he demanded.

"She is the Lady of the Light and Lothlorien. Lady Galadriel is the wisest and fairest of all beings," I answered for her.

"Ristaë," she smiled warmly, "so this is your father." She took a step closer and Dwalin was instantly entranced by her beauty.

"Y-yes, Dwalin son of Fundin at your service," he managed to get out.

"My lady, why are you here?" I asked curiously.

"You have the weapon that could defeat Smaug," she murmered, "though you do not know." We both stared at her gobsmacked and disbelieving.

"No we don't, we only have normal bows, hammers and knives. Nothing speciaor about them," denied my father.

"It isn't a normal weapon. Indeed, it is designed to target the mind rather than physical body," Galadriel explained.

"What is it?" I questioned with wide eyes, then I realised that my finger was still bleeding and held it tightly in my sleeve. It suddenly started tingling, I looked at it and saw it was completely healed. "Did you heal it?" I said to Galadriel.

She nodded before continuing her explanation. "You picked it up recently, it's made of aquamarine and mithril," she said gazing at me intently. I gasped I'm recognition, she meant that beautiful necklace that I had found in the troll hoard!

"You mean this?" I said drawing the necklace out of a pocket and holding it up. The blue jewel slowly turned on the mithril chain and cast blue shadows over my face and the ground

"That's it," she confirmed, "the key to defeating Smaug." Me and Dwalin studied it closely, how could a necklace defeat the powerful Smuag?

"How exactly is that going to help?" Dwalin asked with a raised eyebrow.

"It belonged to Smaug's mother, a half dragon who usually took the form of a human and a very good friend of mine," replied Galadriel.

"You were friends with the mother if that beast?! Why didn't she control it?!" Dwalin spat furiously.

"She died during childbirth," Galadriel said flatly, "it was just before she died that she enchanted the necklace. Smaug has always wanted to know who his mother is and she enchanted the necklace with a spell that will tell him. When the necklace chain goes around a claw, horn or spike it will tell him. It will also daze him for a few minutes and it is during those few minutes that you must kill him. It is your only chance." I blinked and she vanished.

"Where did she go?" I wondered out loud.

"I'm not sure..." Dwalin narrowed his eyes, "but I think we should head back now."

"Ok I'll just get my arrows." As I was collecting them, my thoughts drifted back to Fili and Kili but I pushed them forcefully away.

"So," said my father as we walked back, "what's wrong? I promise I won't tell anyone." I paused, I couldn't tell him, he would practically rip Fili and Kili apart!

"Nothing much, I just had an argument with Fili and Kili," I says making it sound like no big deal. My father searched my face and nodded.

"Ok, well I'm sure it will blow over soon," he said wisely. We reached a fork in the path and I realised that had to go left whilst Dwalin had to go to the right.

"Good night," I says hugging my father, "by the way my room is number twelve in case you need to wake me up or something."

"Good point, I'll see you in the morning," and he turned down the corridor away from me.

"Father," I called after him, "please don't mention the argument to Fili and Kili!"

"No, no of course I won't," he reassured me before waving and continuing down the corridor. Once inside my room, I looked out of my window and saw that it was still a kind if dusk. It seemed that this was as dark as Rivendell got at night. I laced my bed and a sudden wave of fatigue washed over me. It was all I could do to change into a nightgown before I flopped down onto the bed and into a deep sleep.

**Thanks for reading and please review and tell me your opinions on the story!**


	15. Chapter 15

**Hi! You probably know this already but I recently found out that The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Extended Edition comes out in the 4th November this year! Im so excited already!XD**

**DISCLAIMER: I own nothing! Only my OCs! **

"Wake up! Ristaë please wake up!" hissed a voice as its owner shook me and tried to rouse me from my slumber. I blearily opened my eyes and the hazy shape of a hobbit came into focus. I blinked.

"What are you doing here?" I yawned sleepily.

"Waking you up, on Thorin's orders. He said something like the moon runes have been read and it's time to leave," Bilbo replied. Moon runes? Oh yeah, the moon runes on the map, I had completely forgotten about them. "Come on," continued Bilbo, "grab your bag and we'll go."

"I'm getting dressed first."

"You're not dressed?" said Bilbo weakly. I shook my head. "Oh,well, in that case I'll be waiting outside." He then scuttled out of my room in embarrassment. I quickly pulled on my leggings, tunic and cloak, shoulder my quiver and pack then hurried out of the door to Bilbo.

"By the way just call me Taë, it's what everyone else does," I told him.

"Apart from Thorin," he pointed out.

"Yes apart from him," I agreed as we headed down the corridor to where the rest if the company was.

"You took your time," grunted Thorin when we were in earshot.

"I couldn't find one of my knives," I said, shooting Bilbo a look that told him not to mention that I hadn't actually been dressed when he woke me up, "we had to find it." Thorin looked sceptical ruby beloved us in the end.

"Let's go, we make for the Misty Mountains," he ordered loud enough for us to hear but not do loud that he woke up the entire population of Rivendell.

"What about Spring?" I protested.

"You will leave her behind," Thorin said, fixing me with a steely glare.

"But I raised her! Like you did with Finocr!" I argued.

"You were told not to bring her, no one else brought theirs with them," he retorted before turning his back on me and marching out of Rivendell with the rest of the company following with the occasional sympathetic glance shot at me.

"What about Gandalf?" enquired Bofur.

"We're meeting him at the end of the mountains," answered Balin.

A single, solitary tear slipped down my cheek, I knew then that I would probably never see Spring again unless I returned here if I survived the quest. I looked sadly towards the stables one last time and Bilbo encouraged me out of Rivendell like I was a small child. As I passed through the gates of Rivendell I wiped away my tear and ignored Fili and Kili's pleading looks.

"I wish we didn't have to leave Rivendell so soon," sighed Bilbo as he paused and looked back at the slowly shrinking House. Trying to ingrain every last detail to his memory.

"I suggest that you two keep up," Thorin advised sarcastically. We both turned around and saw Thorin waiting impatiently for us to carry on.

"Coming, coming," I muttered just loud enough for him to to hear. He looked at Bilbo in contempt and strode away to resume his position at the head of the company.

"Come on Bilbo, he's right," I told him, he took one last look at Rivendell before we continued walking.

**Time Skip**

"When's lunch? I'm hungry," moaned Bombur as we plodded through the grassy planes towards the distant mountains.

"Bombur," I said through gritted teeth, "for the last time please STOP MOANING!" Everyone else grumbled things in agreement like 'please Bombur' and 'everyone else is hungry to'.

"We will have lunch by that tree over there," announced Thorin, pointing to a tree no more than 100 yards away. We all cheered especially Bombur! Everyone perked up a bit at the thought of lunch and we made it to the tree within a few minutes! Ages later, (well actually it was probably only a few minutes but it felt like ages), lunch was ready and when served we attacked it like a pack of starving wargs. Even Thorin at more like a normal dwarf than an uptight exiled king! No one spoke until they'd finished, which didn't take very long as they're were no leftovers.

"That's better," grinned Bofur with an empty bowl at his feet.

"Yeah," I agreed stretching my arms up above my head.

"We will stay here for half an hour," decided Thorin, "do what what you want but stray no further than 30 yards from this tree."

"So Bilbo, what do you like to grow in your garden?" I asked randomly.

"Well... Things like roses and pansies, their my-" began Bilbo before he was interrupted. I glowered at them.

"Sorry Bilbo we need to talk to Taë," Fili cut in.

"In private," Kili added so Bilbo stepped away a bit and they led me away a bit. I crossed my arms and looked at them in expectation.

"We both want to apologise," started Kili.

"We shouldn't have done that bet," continued Fili.

"We're sorry," they finished in sincere unison.

"I've heard stories about you two, in taverns close to wear you used to live." They froze as I spoke, it seemed they knew what I was talking about.

"Yeah about that," croaked Kili but I cut him off.

"You've both slept with more tavern whores than I care to recall, I should have known it was only a short time before you came after me," I snapped.

"No we'd never do that!" Fili protested, "we were drunk and so were they. It never happened when we were sober!"

"Do you know how it felt? Think about it, you two are my best friends and then you bet over me! My feelings for you two go no further than friendship! Whether that changes at all in the future is not worth betting over," I hissed.

"All right lass, calm down you've given a decent tongue lashing. They won't do it again," soothed Balin from behind me, he'd obviously been eavesdropping.

"How can I certain that they won't?" I retorted.

"We swear we won't," pleaded Kili, "we didn't think you'd find out and react like this."

"I've changed over the past years. I'm not the same dwarf that you knew. The world outside the Blue Mountains changed me, as I travelled I saw horrors that still haunt my dreams now. During my apprenticeship my best friend was raped on an alleyway, I didn't reach her screams quick enough so I found her bleeding her life out on her own. She told me what happened and I stayed with her until the blood from her throat stopped and her eyes looked upon me unseeing." Tears welled up in my eyes at the memory and I saw her dead eyes again before me. Fili and Kili looked shocked.

"We didn't know, we ARE sorry," Fili said quietly. Then the tears came and he put an arm round me as I started weeping uncontrollably, mourning my friend from long ago. Kili joined us and they held me despite the fact that I had spurned their company yesterday and today. Perhaps I could trust them. I hoped so.

**Sooo what do ya think?**


	16. Chapter 16

**Hello! Thank you to followers/favouriters/reviewers! Sorry this chapter took a bit longer to get up but I had lots going on! Anyway...**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing apart from OCs!**

The rain gushed down from the stormy sky in powerful torrents that forced us to edge practically sideways along the precarious mountain path. If you could call it a path anyway, it was more of a ledge just wide enough to walk on. After I had spilled the beans on the way here, the atmosphere between Fili, Kili and I had been quite I uncomfortable. What with everything that had gone on it was only natural I supposed. I still didn't truly trust the brothers even though their promises and apologies seemed sound enough.

The storm had come out of nowhere. One minute the sky had only of hint of grey, the next it was full of angry dark grey storm clouds. Thunder rolled over the mountain tops and white lightning flashed down around us.

"We must find shelter!" Thorin bellowed over the howling wind and thunder claps.

"Obviously!" I yelled back and he glared at me. A particularly strong bolt of lightning struck home deep into the mountain ridge above us and a loud crack resonated through the steep rocky gulley. Stones tumbled down above us and fell off the path below. We heard something big sliding down the cliff above us, towards us. Dwalin looked up.

"AGAINST THE SIDE! GO RIGHT AGAINST THE MOUNTAIN!" He yelled as an did as he said and flattened ourselves against the mountain hastily. A huge boulder came into sight then left it again as it plunged down below. That had been close. Very close. A towering figure suddenly loomed above us, all sharp edges and raw power. I was so shocked and terrified that I couldn't speak. Somewhere along the line Bilbo yelped in fright. The figure moved towards us.

"Well bless me! The legends are true! Giants! STONE giants!" Bofur shouted in utter amazement. I studied the giant closer and realised that it really was made of stone! Before we could do anything else, the ground beneath us shuddered and the strangest sensation of being lifted up was felt. Stones grated together as the very mountain split between Fili who was next to me and Kili. The crack grew wider and wider forcing Fili and Kili's outstretched hands further and further apart just as they were about to grasp each others. A shadow descended over us, I looked up.

"We're on the legs of a giant," I shouted out as I saw the rough outline of an upper torso, arms and head above us. We began to be twisted about violently, only just being able to cling on the rock behind us at times. The leg that Fili and I were on seemed to be moving more, it got worse as spasms ran through the legs more frequently to. A loud crash and particularly fierce jerk later, the other leg crashed into the mountain side at an angle that allowed that half of the company to get to the relative safety of the path once more. My half however, continued to swing about and then the face of the mountain swung into view. Closer and closer it came until we realised that it wasn't going to stop. That we were going to end our lives as a gruesome display of scrambled brains, shards of bone, shredded skin and exploded guts. I squeezed my eyes shut tight unwilling and too terrified to look death squarely in the eye. I braced myself for the inescapable impact. We smashed into the mountain with force that jolted me to the very core of my being. I felt no pain, only shock and fading vibrations. Is this what death feels like? I wondered, painless and relieving.

"Nooo!" cried a voice in anguish that jolted me from my stupor. I was alive! I opened my eyes and took deep breaths to calm my frantic pulse and brain. Then I unsteadily got to my feet only to be swept off them again in a giant hug to rival all hugs ever. My father's strong, familiar arm enveloped me and held me so tight that I thought my ribs would crack under the pressure.

"Fa," I mumbled into his sodden coat and squeezed him back.

"I thought I'd lost you Taë," he said to me, "when you crashed into the mountain we thought that you'd all been killed."

"I'm fine though, don't worry," I reassured him before finally letting go. I looked around at the others who had crashed along with me and saw no visible injuries. Kili was still embracing Fili tightly with their foreheads pressed together. It would have destroyed Kili if Fili had died. He would have been inconsolable. Thorin had his arms round them both, that was the first time I had ever seen him do that so it was a bit of a surprise.

"Alright let's go!" Thorin called, "everyone look for a cave, we need one to stay in." We were all tired and when tired people make mistakes. Up here, a mistake could easily be fatal so the sooner we found a cave the better.

"Hey, where's Bilbo?" Bofur said looking around.

"There!" exclaimed Dori, "he's there!" We followed to where he was pointing and saw Bilbo's hands peeking over the edge of the path.

"Bilbo!" I gasped hurrying over to him, "how are we going to get him back up?"

"Grab my hand!" Nori called, reaching out to him. Bilbo stretched out one of his hands stone grasped it firmly. "Someone get his other hand," said Nori so I grabbed it and together we heaved him up.

"I thought we'd lost our burglar," said Bofur.

"He's been lost ever since he left the Shire. He never should have come," said Thorin spitefully and then he turned in his heel and continued along the oath in search of a suitable cave in which to stay the night. I stared after him in shock, that was low, even for Thorin.

"Ignore him Bilbo," I told him, "you've helped on this quest and Gandalf believes you will play an important role in the defeating of Smaug." He nodded somewhat sadly before making his way along the path once more.

We eventually found a cave about half and hour later. Once it had been checked out we all managed to dredge up a tired grin on relief, shelter from the rain at last! Thankfully the inside of the dave was dry and offered good protection from the wind and rain. I found a space anded ragged a blanket over me, not bothering with a bedroll for the night. The floor was sand after all. I vaguely noticed poor Bofur leaning against the wall keeping watch before I was out like a lamp.

**Please review! **


	17. Chapter 17

**Im so so sorry that this chapter was later than usual!:(**

**I have to say, thank you so much for all the positive feedback from last chapter! It made my day:) Thank you so much to followers and reviewers and favouriters!**

**Disclaimer: I only own Ristaë! Nothing else!**

My dream suddenly changed to falling through the sky. Thud! And I woke up. I screamed loudly, I actually WAS falling! Well, I was, now I was sliding through a twisting maze of tunnels that stank of rotting flesh along with the rest of the company as far as I could tell. The tunnel abruptly dropped down and my stomach lept as the dim tunnel suddenly dropped and downwards and then we fell out onto the ground below. WHAM! I was flat out on rough ground and gasping for air like a fish out of water. I tried to drag myself to my feet but I was knocked down hard again by someone else falling on top of me.

"Sorry," mumbled Fili guiltily as I glared at him before rolling my eyes and helping him to his feet.

"Where are we?" I murmured as I took in our surroundings. We were trapped in an open topped cage. Damn. I drew my knives and heard more dwarves doing the same with their various weapons. I made my way to my father and the moment I reached his side, blood curdling screeching filled the dank, musty air. Goblins.

"Form ranks!" Thorin shouted, "don't let them catch you!" Fourteen bruised dwarves and a battered about hobbit formed ranks as best as we could in the confined space of the cage. I looked down and swallowed. If we fell out of the cage then we would be killed by merely hitting the bottom of the chasm. The goblins drew nearer brandishing rusty, serrated knives. They burst through a concealed gate in numbers over three times the company's 15. Goblins surrounded us and attacked from all directions. As we fought back, we hacked at limbs, burst boils, ripped open puny throats and gutted the foul beings. Black blood rained everywhere, pus gave us an unwanted shower and miscellaneous grisly things flew. Theirs numbers swelled in every spas sing second while ours gradually shrank as we were captured, disarmed and taken away. When I felt slumber arms tighten around my neck and cut off my air I resigned myself to capture rather than a painful strangulation. The took my precious weapons and started buffeting me along with kicks, punches and pinches. Not that I could feel them very well through my lightweight though tough armour. The crude paths were made of rickety planks lashed together with aching and frayed rope that looked close to snapping.

After a bit we reached a large roughly circular platform with even more goblins stationed around the edges. I'm front of us, on a throne decorated with skulls covered in mouldering flesh, sat one of the most repulsive things that I had ever seen! The Goblin King. Most goblins were scrawny little things but this one was over twice the height of a normal one and had a bloated belly accompanied by numerous flabby chins.

"Who would be so bold as to come ARMED into _my _kingdom?" he boomed, standing up and making his great rolls of fat wobble about even more. No one answered. "Spies? Thieves? Assassins?" He pointed his goat skull topped staff at us accusingly.

"Dwarves your malevoulence," simpered a goblin. Mahal the Great Goblin is dim! I thought, but then, aren't all goblins?!

"He he hee!" Chuckled the sickly sovereign. "If they won't talk then let's make them SQUAK!" What did he mean? "Bring up the mangler... Bring up the Bone Breaker... Lets have them begging for mercy!" Goblins around us squealed in terrible joy and sprang into action to get the torture machines ready for use. How were we going to get out of this one?

"_Bones will be shattered, necks will be wrung,_

_You'll be beaten and battered from racks you'll be hung,_

_You'll die down here and never be found,_

_Down in the deep of Goblin Town!" _he sang, "we'll start with the youngest!" He added, slyly eyeing up Kili who stood just behind me. "Actually, nah. He'll be second, the first will be the girl!" My stomach dropped and I started trembling in fear.

"No!" Dwalin growled and moved in front of me.

"Wait," continued Thorin, stepping out to the front of the company and into the sight of the Goblin King.

"Well, well, well... Look who it is! Thorin son of Thrain, son of Thror! King under the mountain!" he sarcastically gasped and bowed mockingly. "Oopps! But I was forgetting, you don't HAVE a mountain which makes you nobody really..." Exactly the wrong thing to say! I could feel Thorin's anger from here. "Oh look! The Bone Breaker's ready! You can go first on that, I wouldn't to kill The Pale Orc's most sought after." Thorin sucked in his breath. "You didn't know he was still alive?" he asked teasingly, "well now you do! Get him and the girl, then get them ready for fun!" He ordered his minions. They instantly scuttled forward to grab us. Thorin was frozen to the spot in shock and horror with the news of his nemesis' survival. A goblin approached me and reached out to pull me away so I punched its face and felt his nose shatter beneath my fist. They eventually secured me no matter how hard I kicked, punched and clawed at them. I was dragged towards the Mangler, a well named thing a that to! I was shoved against it then tied in place to await my painful and draw out death. To my left I could see Thorin being roped onto the Bone Breaker and the Great Goblin grinning with Sauron-ish delight at the prospect of watcgung us screaming in pain at his barbaric torture. I looked at the company desperately and said my silent goodbyes.

_Goodbye Father, I'm sorry that you have to watch me die like this._

_Goodbye Fili, thanks for being one of my best friends throughout my life._

_Goodbye Kili, thanks for being my best friend and I- I hope you know that I care for you. Always._

My father looked at me with tears welling up in his eyes, unable and powerless to do anything to save me and his best friend. Kili and Fili looked at us in despair. I was their best friend from childhood. And Thorin was their uncle. And we were both about to die.


	18. Chapter 18

**Why hello there! Thank you sooo much to my favouriters, reviewers and followers! Sorry about the cliffhanger from last chapter!:D Anywayyyy... on with the actual chapter! **

Memories ran through my brain in a frenzy of frantic waves as I prepared myself for a painful death. Learning to fight. Saying goodbye. Pranks. Feelings. My best friends. Who would watch me die. Mother. Father. Kili. Fili. Wood creaked and the Great Goblin started to count down the seconds to our imminent deaths.

"Three...! Two..-" he was interrupted by a flash of blinding light that forced me to n lose my eyes even tighter as I couldn't shield then with my bound hands. The light dimmed as quickly as it appeared and a familiar voice echoed through the underground kingdom.

"Take up arms... Free the captives... FIGHT!" My eyes flew open and my heart rejoyced at the sight! Gandalf stood by the throne with his staff and sword and the goblins and the company were fallen on the ground. But as Gandalf spoke they had picked themselves up and now the scrabbling around for their weapons. Kili grabbed his and weapons and mine before coming over to me with a dagger in hand. As quickly as he could, he sliced the rope that bound me as I immediately sprung off the torture machine. His brown eyes revealed the emotions that his face wasn't. He hugged me briefly and smiled before handing me my precious weapons.

"Come on, lets go and kill some goblins!" he cried and we sprinted off after the rest of the company, our knives and swords flashing as goblin after goblin perished at our hand. Good ridance, I thought, they had intended to hand Thorin over to Azog and torture the rest if us to death! Me and Kili were at the back of the company so I had to constantly check over my shoulder for outraged goblins as well as to my sides. Goblins were fast. Nearly as fast as dwarves so we had to run hard and fast to escape the oncoming hoard that was gathering behind us. We hacked away at them and they fell back howling and writhing in pain but it was never enough. Never nearly enough to stop them coming. As each one fell, another two replaced it with even angrier faces each time. I glanced to my left and slashed a goblin in the stomach and a veritable fountain of black blood spurted out. I finished him off by splitting his heart in two and puncturing his lungs. Suddenly, from up ahead came a gut-churning THUMP! SQUELCH-ey noise. I grimaced, I almost felt sorry for the goblins that were being crushed. Almost but not quite. We kept on running. Kept on killing. Kept on dodging and parrying attacks and blows. The wooden planks that kept us suspended above the abysses creaked and on occasion cracked beneath our feet! An instant later, I crashed into Kili who had come to an abrupt halt in the middle of a particularly unstable bridge with the rest of the company. Typically, I hadn't noticed.

"Ooff!" I gasped, "sorry!" He didn't say anything in response and gestured ahead. I looked and immediately cursed myself under my breath for not noticing. The Great Goblin stood looming over Gandalf who was at the front of the company bravely defending it. The Goblin sneered nastily.

"What will you do now, _Wizard_?" he jeered mockingly, "you thought you could escape ME and you failed! My people will indeed feed well tonight...!" The Great Goblin took another step forward raising his staff menacingly. So Gandalf slit open his stomach revealing his innards for all to see. He immediately clamped a hand over his wound and gaped at Gandalf disbelievingly and moaned in agony. Gandalf finished him off by cutting out his bloated throat. The huge goblin began coughing so hard that blood poured out of his wound and more blood seeped past the large hand on his mortal wound on his stomach. The he toppled face first into the ground. As dead as his minions that we had slain earlier. The impact if which the carcass hit the floor as astounding! The ancient rope that suspended the bridge we were in snapped and then things happened very quickly. The chunk we were all standing on suddenly broke away and plummeted downwards, taking us to our deaths once more.

**Meh. This chapter is MUCH shorter than the rest of them I know:( But I had writers block and homework. Anyway. The next chapter will be up as soon as I can post it. As always, please review:) they inspire me so!**


	19. Chapter 19

**This chapter is longer than the last one!:D YAY! And it came wuicker to because I basically sat myself down and said to myself:**

**"If you type this up then you get... UNLIMITED BISCUITS FOR THE REST OF THE DAY!" so yeah, i bribed myself!XD**

**Thank you to my fabulous reviewers, followers and favouriters! **

**Disclaimer: I own nothing apart from Ristaë! Everything you recognise belongs to Peter Jackson and J.R.R. Tolkien! *bows deeply in reverence***

I clung in for dear life as the air rushed past us and my hair practically stood on end! Thankfully, no goblin were falling down with us so it was only the company falling downwards. Most of us were on our stomachs which meant that as we clutched our weapons we could the distant ground come closer and closer. The crevasse steadily grew narrower so the sides of the bridge scraped against rock with more and more force with more splinters flying everywhere until we slowed down and then let us come to a juddering halt. We all breathed a sigh of relief. Our relief didn't last long. After a brief moment or two of respite, the pressure against the side gave way and we tumbled downwards once more. This time however, we only fell for a few seconds before hitting the ground, Actual SOLID ground once more to our relief!

"Well that could've been worse,' said Bofur cheerily from somewhere above me. CRASH! Something heavy fell on top of us, weighing down heavily and squashing the breath out of me with violent force.

"Ughh," I groaned as i was squished between planks, "what is that?"

"No idea," grunted Nori from beside of me. Without any warning, the crushing weight was gone and I breathed in deeply, relishing the feeling of full lungs once again. I heard more grunts, groans and moans as planks were shifted and I gingerly pushed away the wood that was on top of me. I stood up slowly and slightly unsteadily and brushed myself off. As soon as I straitened up again I felt and heard my back click so I unwillingly forced myself to stretch my arms upwards and re-click my back to stop the pain and discomfort. Once I'd done so, I felt the ground vibrate slightly beneath my feet. Heard the now clearly audible sound of claws clacking against stone. I looked towards where the sound was coming from and gulped. Thousands upon thousands of angry goblins were bearing down on us. Then I noticed the dead body of the Great Goblin on the pile of planks that had once been a bridge. So that was what had hit us!

"Ummm... Mr Gandalf?" cried Dori uncertainly. Gandalf was staring at them trying to formulate an escape plan to save us again.

"Only one thing can save us now," he uttered, "daylight." And he took off running down a path ahead of us. We all sprinted after him as fast as we could. Even over the pounding of our booted feet I could still hear the faint sound of goblin claws behind me. We rounded a bend and a spot of light that signified the exit of the mountain revealed itself! The sight of it gave our weary selves more adrenalin and we all ran faster to reach it. Gandalf stood by it and counted us all through

"Ummmm... Mr Gandalf?" cried out Dori uncertainly. Gandalf was staring at the goblins trying to formulate some kind of escape plan to save us once more.

"Only one thing can save us now," he uttered, "daylight." And he took off running up the track ahead of us, away from the oncoming hoard. We all sprnted as fst as we could after him. The path was narrow and we often scraped against it, adding to our already large collection of cuts and bruises. Even over the pounding of my booted feet, I could still hear the Constantine clicking of claws upon stone behind us. We rounded a bend and the exit to this maze of horrors appeared. I quickebed my pace, adrenalin coursing through my veins, urging me trulers running. Gandalf paused at it and counted us through to check we were all still with him.

"7... 8..." he said, "9..." as I ran past him and into the early dawn light. I clamped my eyes shut against the rays of light that were positively blinding after spending so much time underground. I cautiously opened my eyes into a squint and they slowly adjusted back. I opened my eyes fully and looked at our surroundings. We were in a pine forest of skinny pine trees and the odd large boulder. I relaxed and then a sudden wave of fatigue overtook me and I sat down heavily, leaning against a tree while trying to get my breath back from the frantic sprint.

"Where's Bilbo?" asked Gandalf in worry. We looked around us and saw... No Bilbo. He'd gone.

"I think I saw him sneak away when the goblins first attacked," Nori spoke up.

"Coward," snarled Thorin, "he's probably dead."

"Yeah," Dwalin agreed so I glared hard at him.

"Ummm... Hi?" said a voice uncertainly. It was-

"Bilbo?" I gasped, "we thought you'd been killed!"

"Bilbo Baggins! Am I glad to see you!" Gandalf exclaimed in relief. Thorin looked slightly embarrassed but he quickly regained his normal facial expression.

"Why did you come back?" Dwalin asked curiously.

"Look, I know you doubt me but-" Bilbo was but off by savage howls and growls from behind us. For a moment I buried my face in my hands. Why was it always us?

"Run! And fast," advised Gandalf before legging it into the trees with the company hot on his heels. Wargs are fast though, faster than fourteen dwarves, one hobbit and a wizard running through trees, avoiding boulders and jumping over tree roots.

"Into the trees!" yelled Thorin so I skidded to a halt and grabbed a branch just above my head to haul myself up with. I gripped the branch tightly and my feet scrabbled around on the trunk for a foothold. Once I had found one, I hauled myself fully up into the lyre and then clambered up even higher. Also in my tree I noticed, were Thorin, Gloin and Bifur. The wargs were swarming around the trees sniffing the ground for our scent trails. They quickly found the trees that we had taken refuge in and started gouging huge claw marks in them as we'll as leaping up to chew at the lower branches. I moved up a branch. Wargs, it turned out, can jump pretty high so we had to keep on climbing higher into he tree until we were securely out of biting zone.

"Is it just me or is this tree swaying?" Gloin said in alarm. Thorin stayed stock still for a moment.

"You're right!" he said slowly and looked down at the wargs below, "the damned things are trying to push the tree over!" A brief glance down and around confirmed that we were all swaying in the trees!

"Jump!" I yelled, "jump into another tree!" Without waiting for the others, I timed my jump carefully and leapt into the next tree, hoping and hoping that I wouldn't fall. Luckily, I didn't and the others that were in my tree jumped after me just as their tree toppled over and hit the tree we were currently in with five other dwarves. The combined weight of nine dwarves and the pressure of a tree hitting it was all too much for the poor tree we were all in. It lurched about forcing aid to jump into ANOTHER tree! This happened again and again until the entire company was all in the same tree. Which just so happened to be on the very edge of a cliff! The blasted wargs kept on digging and scrapping at the bottom of the tree, but an unexpected flaming pine cone shot past my ear and into the midst of them.

"Here, Taë! Catch!" Kili shouted and threw a faintly smouldering pine cone at me. I caught it, blew on it to encourage a flame and lobbed it at a warg. Somehow, it turned out to be a direct hit and hit the ghastly being on its shoulder causing it to turn tail and run. More pine cones showered to the ground and the dry shrubs and grasses caught alight and spread through the forest. All of the wargs had now fled, to where, we did not know.

"YAYY! So long flea bags!" I cheered. Then our tree started to fall; over the edge of the cliff!

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	20. Chapter 20

**Hellooooo there! Another chapter! Well obviously otherwise you wouldn't be reading this right now... Anyway that's not really the point! Thank you to my amazing reviewers, followers and favouriters! You totally RULE!:D**

**Disclaimer: I only own Ristaë!**

Creeeeeeaaaaakkkk! I felt and heard the tree creaking to a halt at a near horizontal angle over the edge of the cliff. When the tree had begun to fall, I had still been only about half way up the tree so I was closer to land than some of the others. I scanned the forest whilst hanging on and saw in despair that about five wargs had returned. All of them ahead riders so that was ten enemies. My eyes were instantly drawn to the Orc in the middle. Huge, muscular, un-armoured, mace wielding and pale in colour it could only be; Azog the Defiler upon his infamous White Warg. I sucked in my breath, how was it possible? We'd all thought that the Goblin King was playing a cruel joke on us. But now... It was proven that he had been telling the truth. The Pale Orc was back and more terrible than ever before.

Azog spoke in the black speech, the foul language from Mordor that the orcs used. He said whatever he said in a jeering tone of voice and all of the time he kept his eyes on Thorin. That made me think that he was insulting and taunting him. Thorin seemed to as well for he growled in anger and got to his feet with a determined glint in his eyes. He strode down the tree with his sword drawn and his Oakenshield braced in front of him. As he passed me, I could practically feel the icy coolness of his anger that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up slightly. He thundered off the tree towards his foe who stood upon a rock with his henchmen poised behind him.

"Thorin no!" Fili shouted desperately but Thorin ignored him. We could do nothing but watch as our leader took on his sworn enemy. Alone.

He swung at the warg who dodged it with mocking ease and Azog chuckled. The warg gathered itself then sprung, landing on top of Thorin and knocking him over with a triumphant snarl. Thorin's chest rose and fell heavily as he dragged himself to his feet and bravely faced Azog once more. This time he didn't even get a swing in as Azog's mace smashed into his chest, narrowly missing his face. He fell to the ground and didn't move.

"No," Bilbo whispered, "this isn't right! Why are we sitting here while Thorin faces the orcs alone?"

As he said this, I kept my eyes on Thorin for signs of life. I saw none. The warg approached Thorin and picked him up in her mighty jaws full of sharp teeth. They both turned to face us and Thorin was still limp and unmoving. Then in a swift movement that I barely followed, he grasped his sword and smashed the hilt point blank into the warg's nose, crushing the bones. She howled in pain and threw him towards us. I heard the sound of a sword being drawn and saw Bilbo running down the tree and towards Thorin's prone form. That triggered something in me and I unsheathed my knives and swiftly followed him.

I joined Bilbo in front of Thorin and he randomly started swinging his sword around in attempt to deter the orcs but it didn't work. One of them came forward brandishing a knife and before I could do anything, Bilbo leapt forward and stabbed the Orc in the stomach before repeatedly stabbing him in the chest to finish off the job. I stared at Bilbo in complete shock. Bilbo, sweet, kind Bilbo who wouldn't hurt a fly had just slain a living creature. No matter how malevolent, an Orc was still a living creature and Bilbo had just killed one. This quest really had changed him. More orcs coming forth made me pay attention once more.

"Oh look it's a girl," leered the ugliest one in Westron, "maybe we shouldn't kill her."

"Yeah," cackled another "we can have fun with her later!" My blood boiled. I knew exactly the orcs intended to do. And it wasn't very pleasant at all.

"Oi!" yelled my father, "you'll never have her or Thorin!" That encouraged me and I stepped forwards and killed the nearest warg by gouging out its eyes and cutting his throat to the bone. Dwarven war cries and running boots sounded behind me just as the rider of the now dead warg lunged at me with his sword. I blocked his enraged blow and used my other knife to slice through the sinews of his scrawny neck. Squelching noises came from the direction of the rest of the company who were currently butchering the orcs and wargs. A length of gut that smacked into my stomach shows just how violent they were being. Azog roared in rage as his Orc pack were slaughtered and jumped into the fray himself. Before he could do anything, I whipped an arrow out of my quiver and carefully lined the tip up with his bare throat before releasing it. It seemed to fly in slow motion. The arrow struck him just as Fili's double swords pierced his chest and another well shot arrow hit his temple. Two arrows and two swords; that's what it took to take down the Defiler. Everone stopped and stared in disbelief at Azog. I looked at his newest wounds, an arrow in the chest and temple and both of Fili's swords buried in his chest. Azog swayed on the spot with his eyes wide in shock. Then his beaten body collapsed to the ground and his eyes rolled up into his skull. He was dead! Time seemed to freeze as everyone stared. Then a faint, low moan from Thorin made everyone jump and the remaining orcs let loose crys of savage anger and attacked us once more with renewed vigour. I glanced behind me and saw an Orc raising a blade above Kili, no way was I going to let that happen. I pivoted around and stabbed it between the eyes and it spasmed violently. As Kili looked at the Orc in surprise, a dark shadow descended on us in a whirl of rushing air and wing beats.

"What was that?" Kili inhaled sharply.

"A flying squirrel," I said sarcastically, "I think it's a bird," I continued.

Kili's eyes widened, "Look out!" he cried pointing behind me. I spun around and an Orc with stitches down its face laughed and plunged his knife deep into my side before I could do anything to stop it. I felt the jagged blade tear its way through the layers of my clothing, somehow finding a weak spot in my armour and then deep down through my skin and into my muscle. The intense pain that flared up and consumed my sanity was all that I knew. I barely saw Kili beheading the Orc that had stabbed me. My vision blurred and darkened as I gingerly touched the hilt of the knife, sending a fresh spasm of agony through my body, into my soul. My eye sight dimmed and the last thing I felt before blacking out was a pair of strong arms holding me tightly.

**Oh aren't I evil;) Please review:D Good bye for now:)**


	21. Chapter 21

**Helloooooooooo:) In this chapter we reach the end of the first movie :O So soon I'll be writing from the book:) Anyway, thank you so much to my brilliant reviewers, followers and favouriters:D**

**Also this chapter is going to be from a different point of view. For part of it anyway.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing. JRR Tolkien and Peter Jackson own everything but Taë:)**

**Kili's POV**

The Orc lifted his knife high above Taë and as she turned around I saw him grin maliciously and bring down the blade. Her face face contorted in pain as the dagger sank into her flesh and I leapt forward to kill the Orc; filled with rage. I beheaded it with one stroke and I barely waited for the head to topple to the ground and knelt besude her prone form. The dagger jutted out of her side. She was still conscious but only just. A giant eagle landed beside as just she passed out, grabbed her gently in his talons and took off again in was fluid motion before I could do anything. I stared as they eagle took her off and nearly didn't notice the next eagle land beside me with Fili on its back.

"Kili get on!" he yelled reaching out towards me. I looked at the eagle uncertainly but grabbed my brothers hand and hauled myself up anyway. As soon as I was on, the eagle took off with powerful flaps of his abnormally large wings. Further, more rhythmic beats got us higher up and flying more consistently. Everyone else was flying about 500 yards ahead of us but we easily caught up with them. Behind us, the sun was obscured by thick cloud, the dimmed light reflecting my worry for Thorin's life and Taë's well-being. Three eagles flew at the front and lead everyone else to an unknown destination. Two of them had no passenger and the other one carried Gandalf so I assumed that the two riderless ones carried Taë and Thorin.

"Thorin!" Fili cried out desperately, even though he knew that he wouldn't be heard. Gandalf glanced back at us briefly and in that bus gel look must've taken in our stricken expressions as he whispered something to his eagle and we started moving faster. At a more urgent pace. I foolishly let my eyes wander tot the ground and was instantly reminded of my fear of heights. At least Azog's dead, I thought. Then I swallowed heavily, shut my eyes and hoped that this ride of happiness, worry and immense relief would be over soon.

**Two hours later...**

After two, agonisingly long hours later, the eagles started spiralling over a large outcropping of rock. First of all, Thorin was gently placed down, followed closely by Taë and Gandalf after her. He rushed straight over to Thorin and began muttering some kind of unknown incantation. One by one, the eagles landed on the rock and let their passengers slide off before taking flight again. Mine and Fili's eagle seemed determined to stay in the air as long as possible without letting us off. Which only added to our impatience as the rest of the company gathered in a circle around Thorin, Taë and Gandalf. Finally, the eagle reluctantly flew down and landed gracefully on the rock. That didn't mean that the impact didn't send a jolt through my spine though. None the less, I thanked the eagle and slid off with Fili. We hit the ground running an sprinted over to the company. I joined the circle just as Thorin's chest rose up and down in a more rhythmic way and he moaned and opened his piercing eyes. Being the stubborn dwarf he was, he immediately attempted to stagger to his feet. Dori, Fili and I stepped forward and with our help he was soon stood, if not unsteadily. I breathed a sigh of relief that my uncle and father figure in life was alive and in the process of healing. Further muttering from Gandalf drew our attention back to Taë and I felt guilty as to have forgotten about her so quickly.

Dwalin knelt by her head stroking back her hair with a look of pain on his face. He hadn't wanted his daughter to come on this journey on account of that she could get injured and now she was. His expression basically said that he was now regrettinghis decision.

The knife was still in her side so the wound hadn't bled much though there was dried blood crusted around the hilt which formed and kind if makeshift scab of sorts. But that would onlyale drawing out the knife more painful for her.

"Echuio hiril vuin," murmed Gandalf as we watched, "echuio." Why Gandalf was waking her up now we didn't know and we had choice but to trust him. I looked at her eyes, willing them to open. Her eyelids fluttered slightly then snapped open before she cleared them again as she was momentarily blinded by the brighends of the sinking sun.

**Ristaë's POV**

From the murky depths of unconsciousness, I heard a voice calling me, calling me up to awakeness once more. Hesitantly, I opened my eyes then shut them again due my eyes being accustomed to the dark instead of daylight. Then my face contorted as the relentless throbbing of my side spread its terrible wings. I wondered briefly how it happened before I remembered. An Orc, a knife, searing pain then blackness. I twitched my side and the agonisingly strange sensation of a foreign object inside of meage it'self known. Gandalf's voicit once more cut through my foggy brain.

"Stay still, the knife may have been poisoned but I'm not entirely sure yet.

I forced open my eyes and blinked to get myself used to the light again.

"Is Thorin ok?" I fretted aloud.

"Yes but he has severely bruised ribs that will cause him pain when he does sudden movements. so he isn't allowed to strain himself for at least a week," he replied. That was good though Thorin would need to be physically restrained to stop him straining himself.

"Well? Are you going to take out the knife or what?" my father's gruff voice interrupted.

"Ok on the count of three," said Gandalf closing his hand around the hilt, "one, two," and on two instead of three I felt the now warm blade slide out of my side. It was a very weird feeling and through the torment it kind of tickled. As soon as the tip was out, Dwalin was there applying pressure to the wound to stem the flow of blood. With the blade by one I felt my innards shift slightly and I had to suppress the urge to vomit.

"Was the knife poisoned?" Kili asked slowly and I tensed in anticipation for Gandalf's answer. The wizard sniffed my blood on the said knife carefully to confirm his answer.

"No," I relaxed again, "it doesn't appear to be."

"Can you close the wound? The bleeding doesn't seem to be stopping," asked Dwalin. It was true, I was feeling a little light headed from the loss of blood. Gandalf smiled.

"Certainly, flaya," he simply said and his staff's jewel glowed blue. The spell worked and I watched my wound knitting together again. The skin stretched at the edges of the knife cut and folded over it, covering up the raw tissues underneath. I prodded it gingerly and a faint twinge of pain flared up. Somehow it was nearly healed! I heaved my self up to a sitting position and something in the horizon caught my eye. My jaw dropped. Bilbo followed my gaze and so did his.

"Is- Is that what I think it is?! he gasped. Everyone else looked to and became fixated on the distant horizon. Thorin took a proud step forward, never taking his eyes off the nightly sight we saw.

"Yes," he whispered in reverence, "yes it's Erebor. Our home."

**So I've decided that I will post a new chapter every Saturday? Does that sound ok? Please review and tell me what you think of this chapter? **


	22. Chapter 22

**Sooo it's Thurday I know but im super busy tomorrow and this weekend and I had this chapter written up so I thought I'd post it anyway:):s Thank you soo much to my brilliant followers/favouriters and reviewers:) I really really appreciate your support!:)**

**Also, I've just seen the second hobbit trailer! My friend told me it came out a while ago so I felt VERY stupid :s When I saw it I ran screaming around the house, I kid you not. I didn't help that I'd just had some PowerAde either! XD**

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything apart from my OC!**

Thorin finally tore his eyes off of his homeland and turned around to face us once more.

"I want to know," he began, looking at me and Bilbo intensely, "why you two did that. Risk your lives for mine. Especially, you Bilbo as all I've ever done is shun you."

"What else were we supposed to do?! It wasn't as if any of the others had done anything to help!" I burst out defensively and the rest of the company shifted guiltily. Thorin raised an eyebrow but didn't comment on it. He turned to Bilbo.

"And what about you?" he enquired curiously. Bilbo took a deep breath before he started.

"Look, I'm not a warrior, nor a burglar and I know you don't trust me. I often think of Bag End, it's true. I suppose that's why; you dont have a home. It was taken from you and I'll help you get it back if I can." Just from looking at Thorin I could tell he was emotionally moved by Bilbo's heartfelt speech. That was odd, normally Thorin didn't show any emotion. Certainly, I could feel a build up of tears as I stood up. Ignoring the pain in my side for once.

"You were right to think I didn't trust you. I never have." What?! I thought in shock. Bilbo had just told him that and now he was insulting him?! The dwarf was unreasonable! "I have never been so wrong in all my life." Thorin then did another thing very un-Thorin like. He cautiously stepped forwards and hugged Bilbo tightly. My jaw fell to the floor.

"Group hug!" cried Bofur and promptly joined them. Of course, everyone else followed him and soon there was a large circle of dwarves each with their arms around each other. I have to say, this was probably one of my favourite moments on the entire quest so far. My favourite probably being seeing Kili - and Fili again after the long years of my apprenticeship and the relatively short ones of travelling. Thorin didn't make an attempt to move either. Which was a miracle in its self.

"If there's anyone who can defeat the evil of Smaug then it is us. Loyalty, honour and a willing heart, that is what each and everyone of you possess. They are the qualities that I value above even gold," said Thorin firmly. Woah he was in a good mood. Though that was probably due to the fact that Azof was dead, once and for all.

"We have a very flood chance to," I confirmed happily, "Lady Galadriel told me in Rivendell that this necklace," I pulled it out of my pocket, "will play a vital role in doing so."

"How can that help?" Thorin asked sceptically as the rest if the company also looked disbelieving.

"She said to get it over a horn or a claw and somehow kill him within a few minutes of getting it on him," Dwalin explained.

"Did she-" Thorin began.

"And no before you ask she didn't sway how to kill him," I interrupted and he looked disappointed. Thorin and Balin considered it.

"If it is true then it will be a great asset to our quest," said Balin, looking at the unassuming necklace warily.

"However, if it fails then whoever puts it on Smaug will be instantly incinerated," Thorin pointed out cynically.

"But if it works then Smaug can be slain!" Bofur added cheerfully, "we should definitely try." Mutters of agreement followed that.

The setting sun cast rays of lights over us, bathing me in a golden light and causing the necklace to cast light shadows over us as it slowly turned in midair. Everyone looked at it curiously, not quite sure whether to trust it or not.

"Lady Galadriel would not have lied about it," I assured them, "she told me only the truth." There was a sudden quiet cough from above me and I jumped in shock. Sheepishly, I looked upwards and saw that it was only Gandalf who had an amused smirk on his face.

"I'm sorry to have interrupted but we need to get off the Carrock before it gets darkf," he told us. The Carrock? What was that? Then I realised that it was probably the rock we were currently on.

"Do you even know how to get off?" asked Fili.

"Of course!" Gandalf said affrontedly, "it's just over there." He pointed to the edge that Ori was closest to. Sure enough, there was a cleft in the side that could be easily dismissed as nothing important unless you were right next to it. The circle broke apart as the whole company gathered around the exit. Thorin went right next to it and investigated about how we were to get down. It turned out to be-

"A giant staircase," announced Thorin in confusion, "how did this get here?"

"It was Beorn, who's house we're heading for," replied Gandalf nonchalantly. I could tell that this was news to Thorin because his brow furrowed deeply before he voiced his opinion.

"Why should we go there? He probably can't be trusted, we should just set up camp at the bottom of these steps." I and a few others disagreed with that. I thought that it more logical to go to Gandalf's friends. Some agreed with Thorin though.

"How can we set up camp with only our weapons and only half of a fire flint?!" I snapped, my temper rising. That silenced the Thorin 'supporters' and made them agree with Gandalf because of my perfectly logical logic.

"Enough!" shouted Thorin's thourougly irratated voice, "we shall follow Gandalf as sounds to be the most popular choice," he ground out through gritted teeth. He obviously slightly annoyed at not really knowing where he was going or being fully in charge of the company.

"These steps are very steep. Even for one as tall as me," Gandalf pondered aloud, "I shall go first with Gloin taking up the rear."

"Line up in SINGLE file behind me!" ordered Thorin.

"It's not school!" I protested indignantly. Thorin, of course, glared at me.

"You will do as I say!" he barked right back. Why was he so grumpy?

"Why are you so grumpy?" I voiced my thoughts, "did no one tell you that Azog's dead?!" Thorin's face hardened then softened then hardened again. He came over to me with a determined glint in his eyes.

"Ristaë give me the necklace. I can't risk it being lost," he demanded. I gripped it in my hand in my pocket tighter.

"No."

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	23. Chapter 23

**Ciao lovely readers:D Update for you:) Thank you soo much to reviewers/followers and favouriters:) Also thank you to Doodler100, DarkBrooks, SNOstorm and Caladhriel, for being very loyal reviewers! All so thanks again to Caladhriel for giving me the idea for slappy Thorin! We are also at an amazing 63 reviews! Thank you so much guys!:D**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing! Apart from Ristaë:)**

"What? No?" Thorin repeated incredulously.

"No," I also reiterated. It happened so fast that I didn't have anytime to react. Thorin swung back his hand and slapped me with full force. Right across my face. And let me tell you, that dwarf is strong! The brunt of the force hit my nose and as I lost my balance and fell I herd and felt the bones shatter. Blood poured thickly down my face and coated my lips in a salty, repulsive slime. My nose was throbbing painfully and I no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't stop a few tears from leaking out. There was a sharp intake of breath from the company as the scene unravelled before their eyes. Ili and Dwalin were by my side mere seconds after I fell. They helped me back to my feet but weren't quite sure of what to do about my definitely broken nose. I then noticed Kili storming up to Thorin with anger wrearhing his form like a serpent constricting it's unfortunate prey.

"How dare you do that! She's done nothing wrong!" he yelled furiously.

"She refused to give me the necklace," growled Thorin.

"So you broke her nose?" retaliated Kili, glaring at the King Under The Mountain.

"Watch your tone!" Thorin said in a low but dangerous voice, "I may be your uncle but I'm still your king!" Kili's glare deepened. "I'm talking to you later," Thorin hissed before stalking to the front of the line once more. Kili turned on his heel and strode towards me.

"Thanks for doing that," I smiled gratefully.

"It was nothing," he said shortly, still boiling over with fury that hasn't quite been released. "I was this close to punching him," he continued. Clenching and unclenchimg his fists as an attempt to control his temper.

"How's your nose?" asked Dwalin, steering the topic away from Thorin and Kili's argument. By now, the blood had clotted hand stopped oozing from them angled thing called my nose. It hurt quite a lot.

"It feels like someone smashed a hammer into it."

"Oh. Gandalf, could you speed up the healing process of it?" he asked the wizard.

"Sorry, I don't think I could. You see, I only have a certain amount of expendable energy each day and healing both you and Thorin as well as Goblin Town has greatly depleted it. Going over the limit would not just kill me, it would destroy my very soul," Gandalf explained, "however, if Oin sets it now then Beorn can do more to it."

"Oin! Come and set this Dwalin bellowed for the benefit of deaf old Oin.

"After that we're moving off down the stairs so gather all of your belongings," called Thorin without the slightest hint of guilt for breaking my nose. Oin came over and assessed the breakage with an expert eye.

"Ok, I'm going to shift the bone back into position on three, two-" Oin told me but jerked the bone back with pain shooting through it even worse until after about a minute after which it dulled down a bit. A little fresh blood trickled out at the new position but not much so I just wiped it away with my hand and checked that I still had my knives. Which I did thankfully, along with my bow and the now empty quiver.

"Come on, carefully now," called Gandalf as he lowered himself down to the first step with a great deal of care. "Thorin come now!' he called when he had successfully reached the third step and Thorin followed after only a brief moment of hesitation.

"The rest of you come after me and try to keep at least one WHOLE step in between you and the person front of you,' Thorin said. Oin followed after him, then Ori, Dori and Nori after him. As the company gradually dwindled, Kili looked at me once more.

"Are you sure that you're ok?" he asked in concern.

"Yes, I'm fine. I'll properly clean my nose when we reach a stream of some sort," I reassured him.

"Good," he relaxed slightly, "stay away from Throin ok?"

"Yes, I will," I certainly wasn't looking forward to our next encounter. That was for sure.

"C'mon Fili!" Bofur called as he clambered down, "keep up!" Fili glanced at me once more before running over to the stairs to follow Bofur. Gloin was still waiting there to go down at the back just as Gandalf had instructed him to do. Dwalin, Kili and I hurried over to him just as Fili's blond head disappeared from sight. Well, I thought as I glanced downwards to see the ground a long way off and the seemingly endless steps that went down, down, down. This will be fun. My father went down first with Kili and I just behind him when he was on he was on the second step. The first step had me basically falling about two feet before I hit the actual step. I immediately pressed my back against the step behind me. I really didn't want to take a tumble at the moment, definitely not. This time I was ready for it so it didn't shock me as much when I landed on the step below me. I glanced behind and upwards at the same time and Kili flashed me a smile and urged me to keep on going.

"Keep on going, we need to get down by night fall or we're stuffed."

"Yeah," I answered as I tried to think of manoeuvring down the Carrock in darkness. Not really something that I was going to think of again at the moment. Pretty soon, the continuous descent became a kind of second nature to me. Fall, land, balance. Fall, land, balance. Fall, land, balance. Fall, land, balance. It went on and on and on.

At first I tried to keep count of how many stairs there were but I have up at about fourty-seven which only seemed to be about half way. By now I could just about make out the shapes of trees and the lake that was far below me. I looked up and saw that the top edge of the Carrock couldn't be seen anymore. Which was a good thing not a bad thing though. More steps went by in a daze as we continued down.

Finally, at long last, there were only five steps left... Then four... Then three... Then two... Then one... Then-

"Thank Mahal!" I cried out, "we're at the bottom!" Kili jumped down from the final step and grinned at me.

"I know! My feet are exhausted from the repetitive landing again and again!" he exclaimed.

"Ok, so tomorrow we're going to Gandalf's friend Beorn's house. Hopefully, we will be able to get more supplies and rest for a few days. After that, we're going to Mirkwood," said Thorin once he had checked they we were all there. Of course, his eyes only flickered over me briefly as he'd obviously decided to ignore me for which I was actually grateful for. My spirits had risen at the prospect of a few days of solid rest but they had plummeted again at the reminder of the infamous Mirkwood. The Realm of the elven King Thranduil.

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	24. Chapter 24

**Hello lovely readers! Just out of curiosity, did any of you get a day off of school because of the teacher strikes? I did! Thats also why this chapter is a couple of days early!Thank you so much to my I amazing followers, reviewers and favouriters! Also thanks to Caladhriel for volunteering to Beta this story!**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing! As usual...:(**

"I didn't get a chance to do this earlier," he growled at Thorin. He swung his fist back and slammed it into Thorin's jaw. I winced slightly. My father was renowned for his superior strength and had been known to beat people to near death during one of his drunken rages. A loud crack echoed from the impact. Dawkin had cracked or broken Thorin's jaw. He had never opposed him in the slightest before and now he had done this. For me, I realised, Dwalin had marred his impeccable reputation of himself for my defense. Thorin would practically kill him later.

"We will stay at the bottom of the Carrock for the night and continue on to Beorn's house in the morning," Thorin ground out through teeth gritted against the plain of his jaw. "I will be on watch first tonight," decided Thorin, "then Dori and for the last shift Ristaë." I groaned inwardly at the thought of three hours of boredom and the fight to keep my eyes open.

"As I'm on duty later and there's no food, I might as well go to sleep now," I told my father wearily. He nodded in agreement.

"Dori will wake you on time," he said quietly, still thinking about whether he should punch Thorin again, I thought.

"I know," I smiled, "G' night," I yawned and headed over to where Fili and Kili were settling down for the night. I plonked myself down on the ground next to them, hardly looking at them because as soon as I leaned against the tree, I slipped into a deep sleep.

Orcs were everywhere. And I mean everywhere. They covered the hill I was standing on and further masses of them were drawing nearer from every direction that I could see. The only living soul that I could see who wasn't an orc was Kili. I swallowed hard. So it was me and Kili against the uncountable number of orcs surrounding us? Bring it on.

As if they had heard my silent will for them to come forward, they started moving towards us. With their crude swords being waved about and snarling viscous things in the Black Speech of which they spoke. Kili and I stood back to back, with our knives and swords drawn ad gripped tight. Ready for the fight that we were massively outnumbered in. They all started attacking at once so it was all that we could do to just block the attacks. We slew orc after orc but there was an endless supply that refused to give up.

I had just killed yet another when I heard a agony filled scream from behind me. Kili! I spun around, regardless of the incoming hoards of orcs and ran over to him. He started to sway before me and I caught him in my arms just before he fell. An orcish sword had been run through his abdomen and his face was etched in pain.

"Kili! No!" I cried as the orcs began to draw back slightly to relish in our pain, spewing gutter all laughter as they did so.

"Taë," Kili said weakly, "I'm sorry.

"You're not going to die, Kili! I won't let you! You mean too much to me," I told him firmly even though all I wanted to do was curl up and sob my heart out.

"Everything's going dark," he whispered and lifted up a hand to gently stroke my cheek. "Don't give up Taë, not like I did," he whispered fiercly, "Keep on fighting." And with that he closed his eyes and his body went limp in my arms.

"KILI!" I shrieked in raw grief and -

"Taë! Wake up! It's just a dream!" Dori said frantically as he shook me awake. My eyes flew open and my breath came in sawing gasps.

"Wh-what happened?" I mumbled, hoping that I hadn't been screaming and woken up the entire company.

"You were thrashing about a lot and you nearly punched Kili in the face," he replied matter-of-factly.

"Is it my turn for watch yet?" I asked.

"Yes but do you want me to stay up with you for a bit?" he asked me. No way was I going to let Dori lose his sleep just because I had had a nightmare. Not on my watch.

"No it's fine," I told him firmly, "you need your sleep." He nodded and patted my shoulder.

"Remember to wake Thorin up at first light, or he will have your head," he advised me before heading over to his bedroll next to Ori.

As soon as he had lain down, I walked over to the slowly dying fire. While I was watching, the last remaining log trembled, then collapsed into a pile of embers that caused a burst of sparks to flurry upwards. As they danced up, the breeze caught them in its hand and carried them away until they were finally extinguished. Looking around for firewood, I noticed the meagre pile of two of three logs a sighed. I would have to scour the area for some more to last me though the remainder of the night. For now though, I dropped the logs that were already by the fire on to it and watched the smouldering embers hesitantly lick the dry wood. They grew in confidence and strength; the cool night breeze no doubt helping it burn brighter. Now that I knew that the fire wasn't in any danger of going out, I got I my feet to find more wood. As I did so, my nose twinged sharply and I caught my breath. It was over as quickly as it began and I could breathe again.

To my right was the edge of a wood, the ideal place to find firewood. Sure enough, when I reached it I could immediately see several chunks of wood that would be perfect for the fire. I quickly grabbed as much as I could carry and walked back to the fire; willing myself not to drop the wood. When I got to the fire, I dumped the wood next to it and plonked myself down. I glanced up by the moon to try to get a rough idea of how much time I had left and sighed. Just as I had suspected, I still had a long time to go.

I heard movement behind me so I leapt up and spun around whilst nocking an arrow I my bow defensively. The person stepped forwards with his hands raised and I tightened my grip on the bow. Then I saw his face and I dropped all of my defences. It was only Kili. Typical.

"Hey," he said with a raised eyebrow. I ducked my head sheepishly.

"Yeah, umm sorry about that..." I mumbled guiltily.

"Oh it's fine," he replied, "in fact, I would have thought it a bit weird if you hadn't done so."

"So why are you actually awake?" I asked him.

"I woke up and then couldn't get back to sleep again," he said simply and them came over and sat by the fire. I quietly replaced the arrow in my quiver and joined him there. "Can I talk to you?" he asked me seriously, "if you promise not to laugh? Or tell me to stop?"

I frowned slightly before answering. "Ok, I promise."

"It's about what happened at Rivendell. I just need to get it off of my shoulders and TELL you." I tensed. Did I really want to hear this? "I know that you don't really want to talk about it but I need to tell you." I considered it for a moment.

"Ok," I said reluctantly, "I'll listen." His posture visibly relaxed when I said that.

"Well, the thing is, I might die on this quest. And so might you," he told me. I rolled my eyes in exasperation.

"Everyone had a chance of dying on this quest. Didn't you realise that when you decided to come?"

"Obviously, I did but I've kind of only just properly realised it... Anyway, back to my actual point. What I'm trying to tell you is that even though what happened at Rivendell happened," he took a deep breath before continuing, "I still love you and I think you're my One."

My jaw dropped to the floor. Kili thought that I was his One?! What?!

"Kili... I don't know what to, what to say..." I trailed off in utter shock. Kili shook his head sadly.

"It's alright, I kind of expected you to react like this. Like I said, I just needed to tell you in case I never got the chance," he tried to smile at me but it came out more like a grimace. I nodded, dumbstruck, still not quite believing him. "I think I'm going to go back to sleep now, is that ok?" he asks me, not quite looking me in the eye. I nodded wordlessly and watched him go back to next to Fili. I kept my eyes on him until he'd closed his eyes. When he had, I averted my gaze back to the fire and mulled over what had just happened.

I pondered over my feelings for Kili. I didn't think that I liked him in a romantic way. I certainly hadn't at Rivendell. But possibly in time, I would grow to love him more than a brother...

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